“I want to make your practice painful,” he would say, “so that the race will be a pleasure.” It was his way of reminding us that life is full of occasional hardships. We should get used to it. Self-discipline was an issue in every part of life, in little things as well as big. One minute, self-discipline might mean pushing to break a personal record on the track. In another moment, it might be a matter of seemingly insignificant details.
