| For the Love of the Game(s) CC Olympic Involvement in the Athens Games |
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| By Jennifer Burris Olson |
| “ | It was thrilling to watch Tara working out at the Olympic Training Center! There she is, this petite woman, wearing headphones and a game face, sizing up the huge barbell in front of her. She squats, grips the bar, and pushes it above her head. Wow! It was just a practice session with no medals at stake, but I had to restrain myself from jumping up and down and applauding her.” |
| -- Jen Kulier, participant in the Baca Alumni College | |
Bring together a C.E.O., a photojournalist, an economist, and a weightlifter, and you may find they have some-thing in common: the Olympics. Among the
20-plus members of the CC community who have contributed to the Games are four who participated in the 2004 Games in Athens.
Tara Nott Cunningham ’94 became interested in weightlifting while working at the 1996 Olympics in Atlanta. “I was looking for a way to stay in shape after playing soccer in college,” she says. At the time, women’s weightlifting was not yet an Olympic sport.
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| Tara Nott Cunningham ’94 |
| Photo courtesy of U.S. Weightlifting |
William J. Hybl ’64, chairman and C.E.O. of El Pomar Foundation, was in Sydney when Cunningham won gold. In fact, he organized U.S. participation in the 2000 Games while serving as president of the United States Olympic Committee (1991-1992, 1996-2000).
Hybl’s two decades of involvement in the Olympics includes helping to arrange effective funding for U.S. Olympic athletes, working to institute the U.S. Anti-Doping Agency, and promoting women and minorities within the Olympic movement. He has served as a member of the International Olympic Committee and is currently president of the U.S. Olympic Foundation.
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| Former CC trustee William J. Hybl ’64 carried the Olympic torch one leg of its relay as it passed by the U.S. Olympic Training Center in Colorado Springs in January 2002. Photo courtesy of the U.S. Olympic Committee. |
The 1984 Games in Los Angeles were also the first Olympics for photojournalist David Burnett ’68. Photographing for Time magazine, he captured American gold-medal favorite Mary Decker Slaney moments after she became entangled with South African Zola Budd. He says the photo, emblematic of tragic defeat, is one of the more memorable moments he has captured on film.
“I had been spending a lot of time at the finish line, but got tired of the scrum of photographers and found a patch where there were only two other photographers with a view of the final turn. The accident happened right in front of me,” he says. “As one of my friends says, ‘I would rather be lucky than good.’”
From the 2004 Olympics journal of photographer
Dave Burnett ’68:
We got into the rhythmic gymnastics team practice of the Belarus team. I suppose most ballet companies are filled with girls like this... strong, lean, dedicated, and in this case, very used to being chewed out by their coach. The coach had one of those post-Soviet voices that just dripped socialist unhappiness… a steady stream of bitterly spat invective which, though my Slavic language skills are minimal, were clearly meant to tell these girls they were not up to par… I posed them in the manner of Martin Chambi, my favorite 1920s Peruvian photographer, the way he had posed the girls’ basketball team of Cuzco.
In Athens, Burnett focused his lens on moments of triumph and defeat for ESPN magazine. “At night, 200 photographers would be in the press photo room till two, three, or four in the morning getting their photos out,” he says. “There is no way that you can be in the company of such talent and not feel like you didn’t miss something.”
Burnett says there are fewer surprises at the Olympics now than 20 years ago. “Everything is so built up by the media to be a big story. There is an expectation that someone will win, so it’s not ‘news’ anymore. News is when the unexpected happens.”
Daniel Johnson doesn’t expect, but he does predict. The CC assistant economics professor predicted the U.S. would win 103 medals in Athens; the U.S. won 103 medals. Known as the “Olympics economist,” Johnson argues that countries’ economic, political, and sociological situations can be used to predict participation levels and medal outcomes. His predicted medal counts for the 2000, 2002, and 2004 Games have been amazingly accurate. Looking forward to the 2008 Summer Olympics in Beijing, Johnson predicts that China will have the top medal count.
But that’s not the only CC prediction about Beijing. David Burnett bets that the mass conversion to digital photography means no photo room. Bill Hybl will probably be in the stands, celebrating the Olympic spirit. And Tara Nott Cunningham may tune in from home — to watch the next generation of Olympians.
CC Olympians
Situated just a few miles from the United States Olympic Training Center, Colorado College has long been a home to students, faculty, and staff members interested in pursuing both academic careers and Olympic dreams. More than 20 members of the Colorado College community have gone to the Olympics and Paralympics.
For a complete list of CC Olympians, go here.