From Sheldon Mickles at The Advocate, LSU track star Walter Henning uses failure (a 4th place trophy) as motivation:At the tender age of 20, LSU hammer thrower Walter Henning already has the one thing all athletes in the sport of track and field strive for: a gold medal from a major international competition.
Yet, the first thing Henning sees when he wipes the sleep from his eyes every morning is not a beautiful shiny medal, but the fourth-place trophy he won in the 35-pound weight throw (the indoor version of the hammer) at the NCAA Indoor Championships.
Yes, sitting right next to his bed is all the motivation Henning needs to take the next step in a budding career. He’s already one of the top young throwers in the world after hurling the 13-pound hammer 252 feet, 4 inches to win for the USA at the 2008 IAAF World Junior Championships.
But instead of thinking about that historic victory last July, the first for an American in the hammer in the 22-year history of the world juniors, Henning has been reminding himself of a rainy March night in College Station, Texas.
After setting three school records in the weight throw in his first season at LSU, Henning entered the NCAA meet as one of the favorites to walk away with the title. But after a series of fouls and poor throws, including a best that was more than a foot shorter than he’d thrown earlier in the year, Henning reluctantly took the fourth-place trophy.
But he hardly cherishes it.
“Coming into the meet, there were such high expectations … and I really didn’t perform very well,” Henning said. “It was really disappointing to me. That trophy is sitting right next to my bed so when I wake up every morning I say, ‘I don’t want to see that.’ That makes me want to work harder.”
Read the entire article at: http://www.2theadvocate.com/sports/47136407.html
