Apolo Ohno Gives 110%

Guidepost for Teens

by Kelly Milner Halls

Short-track speed skating is a fast-paced, cutthroat sport. The ice is slick, the blades are razor-sharp, and the turns are wicked. One mistake, one small miscalculation, and you slam into the wall—hard. To make it in short-track, you have to be tough.

Apolo Anton Ohno is one tough guy. And he’s also one really nice guy His amazing performance on the ice at the 2002 Olympics in Salt Lake City not only won him gold and silver medals—it won him a spot in the hearts of fans worldwide.

So how did this cute guy with the signature soul patch become a short-track phenomenon? Natural talent—and hours (and hours!) of training. Apolo grew up in Seattle, the son of a single father. His dad wanted to keep him out of trouble, so he worked hard to make athletics—including swimming and inline skating—his son’s focus. Apolo first stepped onto the ice after mastering the inline skating circuit. “Just to try something different,” he says. He quickly blew the competition away. And once he realized he had the talent to be an elite short-track skater, he gave it his all—“110 percent,” as he likes to say. Five years later, at age 19, Apolo became a superstar.

Guideposts for Teens caught up with Apolo as he was training for the 2003 World Championship in Warsaw, Poland. (He ended up taking silver in the 3,000 meters there!)

GP4T: We heard that you were watching the 1994 Olympic Games in Lillehammer, Norway, on television when you first got the urge to try short track. True?

Apolo: Yes, that’s true. The speed was the number-one attraction for me. Everything looked so smooth. I was amazed by how far the skaters could lean into the turns. It didn’t look natural or real. I kept thinking, “How are they doing that?” And I knew I was going to give it a try.

GP4T: Did you realize you had a talent for it right away?

Apolo: No. At first I was pretty bad—I busted my butt a lot! But I practiced, and I learned a lot. I finally believed I might be really good at it after a coach I respected noticed me. I started to realize my potential at the Olympic Training Center in Lake Placid in 1996.

GP4T: How do you deal with the mental pressure of competing in such an aggressive sport?

Apolo: It is a very aggressive sport, that’s true. But I think any athlete has to learn to deal with pressure. I have my off days and my on days. Most of the time, you just push past it and make things happen. I think the pressure actually makes me perform better sometimes. And once I’m on the ice, all I think about is skating.

GP4T: What’s most important to winning the short-track events—endurance, speed, or focus?

Apolo: I think it’s the whole package, really. You have to have it all. If you’re just fast, so what? Everybody’s fast. If you’re just focused, again, everyone is. You have to pull all those things together to win.

GP4T: What were you like as a teenager in Seattle, before you went to Lake Placid?

Apolo: You know, I was a normal kid. I hung out with my friends, I played basketball, went to the park, had barbecues. As long as I was with my friends, I was happy.

GP4T: Do you think the fact that your father was a single parent made the two of you closer?

Apolo: I do. I think sometimes that’s how it works out with single parents. He supports me 100 percent. He wants me to succeed in sports and in life, so it’s a partnership. I think we take our parents for granted sometimes, but they’re so important. Eventually, most people figure that out.

GP4T: You were so hot on MTV’s Total Request Live after the Olympics. How did you learn to break-dance?

Apolo: Ha! The break dancing was a little something that I used to do for fun back in Seattle—something all my friends did during lunch break at school. But it was fun doing it and being on TRL—just awesome!

GP4T: What kind of music do you like, and what’s in your CD player right now?

Apolo: I like mostly hip-hop and R&B. Right now, I have a burn mix in my CD player that includes a guy named Wayne Wonder, an R&B singer from Jamaica.

GP4T: What sports do you play just for fun?

Apolo: Short-track is my specialty, but I do enjoy many other sports—pretty much all other sports, actually. But I do them for fun, so it’s no high-caliber performance.

GP4T: Is there a sport you’ve tried that you actually stink at?

Apolo: Snowboarding! I was in Italy a while back, and I went snowboarding one time. I kept falling, and the people on the lifts were looking down at me, kind of stunned. I don’t think they’d ever seen one person do so many flips on accident. I kept landing on my head.

GP4T: Do you have to worry about getting hurt when you try new sports?

Apolo: Well, I try to get out there and have fun and live my life. But I have to be a little tentative, because an injury would put an end to my career.

GP4T: Every girl in America is dying to know . . . do you have a girlfriend?

Apolo: No, I don’t have a girlfriend. It’s very hard to keep a steady relationship because I’m always traveling, and my training schedule isn’t exactly the best for relationships!

GP4T: What’s next for you?

Apolo: I’m training and competing right now, so my mind and goals are focused on short-track. Beyond that, I’m not certain. I would love to pursue an entertainment career. With my success in the Olympics and through my sport, it really has shown me so many options that I could go with in my future. Only time will tell.

GP4T: What would you like people to know about the real Apolo Ohno?

Apolo: I’d like them to know that I’m just normal—that I focus my time and energy toward something I love and that it has paid off in the long run. But I like to do what most teens like to do, hang out with my friends and have a good time.

GP4T: What advice do you have for teens?

Apolo: Follow what you believe in. Don’t let anybody or anything stop you from reaching your goals! Dream big and have fun.

Some fast facts on the short-track champ
• Apolo finished high school (with great grades) via the Internet Academy.
• He once sang (Alleluia!) in an all-boys choir.
• He was a regional champ in breaststroke as a swimmer.
• He was one of People magazine’s “Most Beautiful People” in 2002.
• He had the flu at the 2002 Olympics—he was sick in bed for four days before he skated!

Thousands of years ago, people played a ball game with their feet. People from different cultures around the world played the game their own way. Different types of balls and different rules were used. But the object was the same: players would pass the ball back and forth without using using their hands.

"The Chinese played a game where they kicked a feathered ball," says Bruce Guettich, president of the World Footbag Association. "Other Asians kicked a ball made of bamboo. Even American Indians played a similar game."

But it wasn't until 1972 that the modern game called "footbag" came to be. That was the year that John Stalberger met Mike Marshall in Oregon.

"John was looking for a way to exercise his injured knee," Bruce says. So Mike showed him "the sack" - a piece of cloth cut from the end of a sock, filled with corn, and sewed up tight.

Mike showed John how to play. The small 2 1/2-inch sack is kicked from one player's foot to another player. Players can use their bodies - but no hands! - to move the sack down to the feet for kicking. Two or more people pass the sack back and forth. The object is to keep the sack moving without touching the ground, for as many passes as possible.

John loved "hacking the sack." He and Mike made some changes to the sack during the next few years. Different versions were filled with corn, rice, beans, and even buttons. Finally, they settled on the little plastic pellets that fill footbags today.

Then John and Mike had to come up with a name. They decided to call their 2 1/2-inch ball a "Hacky Sack." They created official rules, and began to introduce this fun fitness hobby to the world. Bruce Guettich and his friend Greg Cortopassi joined the team to help spread the word.

Sadly, Mike Marshall died before he could see the new game become widely popular. But John Stalberger didn't give up. He continued to travel across America, showing people the new game of footbag. Bruce and Greg formed the World Footbag Association-a club footbag fans can join for just one dollar.

Last year was the 25th anniversary of footbag. "And it's only the beginning," says Bruce. "The World Footbag Association has 40,000 active members and is growing at a rate of 600 to 800 new members every month." Bruce hopes you'll be the very next footbag fan to join.

For more information on footbag, write to:

World Footbag Association
P.O. Box 775208
Steamboat Springs, CO 80477

WFB Web Page:
http://worldfootbag.com/
E-mail: This email address is being protected from spam bots, you need Javascript enabled to view it

Photo by Kevin Foster

US Kids, Volume 11, Issue 5, Page 5
July/August 1998
Copyright Children's Better Health Institute

by Kelly Milner Halls

Ask 1998 Grand Nationals BMX champion Thomas “The Taz” Fernandez how long he’s been riding a bike and he’ll reply, “Forever.” That’s because the motocross master first took on the two-wheeler as a 3-year-old toddler.

“Anything with wheels was like a magnet,” says 13-year-old Thomas. So when he discovered a BMX (bicycle motocross) park in Albuquerque, New Mexico, at age 5, he was instantly hooked on the “extreme” sport.

Not even facing the steepest slope fazed this risk-taker. By the time he was 6, he’d claimed his first Grand National Championship.

What’s the secret? “Determination,” he says. Every weekend, and almost every other day for the past nine years, Thomas has been a regular at his local BMX track.

Being a BMX champion isn’t the only thing keeping Thomas busy. If Thomas doesn’t maintain a C average, all he gets to ride is the school bus. “So I keep my grades up,” he says.

“I like to win,” Thomas says, “but that’s not what I think about when I race. I think about doing my best. You’ve got to ride with heart,” he says. “If you follow the heart of it, you’ll have fun, and the rest will fall into place.”

Copyright (c) Guidepost for Kids

Juggling Success:
13-year-old Gena Shvartsman

U.S. Kids, June 1997

by  Kelly Milner Halls

When thirteen-year-old juggler Gena Shvartsman peeks out of her dressing room, she sees nothing but excitement! An explosion of light and color fills the huge arena where she's about to perform. Thousands of people are waiting for "The Greatest Show on Earth" to begin. Music rings out. Spotlights gleam. Kids are holding circus balloons and cotton candy. Grown-ups are holding their kids. And everyone is whispering.

According to Gena, the sound of so many people whispering is a little like rolling thunder. But she's hardly ever nervous. "I'm not really the person who is shy," she says with the slightest hint of a Russian accent. "I usually have shows without any dropping because I practice very hard. I love performing well. That's why I'm here." Gena has been "performing well" for almost seven years--the last two with the Ringling Brothers and Barnum & Bailey Circus.

"My father is a professional juggler and a coach," Gena says, "so I've really been around it all my life. When I was six years old, I started juggling with one ball and slowly added more balls, one at a time. Soon I was up to eight. Then I could juggle almost anything." Just after she turned seven, Gena started juggling for the Grimmy Family Circus. "We performed in the New York Catskill Mountains for groups of about 3,000 people. Much smaller crowds then, but it was still fun."

Today, Gena performs for audiences of up to 20,000. At thirteen, she moves like a tiny ballerina--delicate and gracefully smooth. Glitter sprinkled across her rose- and-lavender costume captures the spotlight and sends tiny flashes back into the crowd--flashes almost as bright as Gena's smile. Somehow she is able to dance and tumble while keeping half a dozen clubs floating through midair. Somehow the lovely young juggler makes it all look oh-so easy.

But Gena admits that being a topnotch juggler is anything but easy. "Being a juggler is fun," she says. "But my father and I practice very hard--for like eight hours a day--just so I can do my best. I think I do a good job, but I always want to get better. And I wouldn't want to do the same thing for two years, over and over and over. So in almost every city we visit, I change old tricks to new tricks. That takes lots and lots of practice."

Also used as a 6th Grade Benchmark Testing Passage
http://rsdweb.k12.ar.us/departments/bnchmrk/read/js.htm