Sports are often a source of inspiration for people in various walks of life. A lot of important life lessons such as teamwork, learning from and accepting defeat, patience and perseverance are learnt on the field. CAT aspirants too can look up to sports for motivation.
Here we are looking up to a lesser-known sporting legend Dave Wottle. He was an American athlete who competed in the Men’s 800m race. He had already made himself a name by the 1972 Munich Summer Olympics, but little did people anticipate that they were going to bear witness to what I personally believe is the most inspirational moments in track and field sports.
Dave Wottle had a difficult few weeks leading up to the games. He had suffered from a knee injury which put his whole effort into a jeopardy. Owing to the injury, Dave was only able to train about 50% of what he normally would. But here comes the one quality, which is also the focus of this article, “Consistency.” Dave trained every day, without any cheat days. His hard work paid off and he managed to qualify for the Olympics of 1972.
Dave was not the crowd favourite, that would be Yevgeniy Arzhanov from the Soviet Union. The heats leading up to the final race did not draw crowds towards Dave either. That did not deter Dave. In the back of his head, he had faith in all the work he had done. Now watch what happened in the race.
Let us break this race down and see what you as a CAT aspirant can take away. As I had mentioned earlier, the key theme here is “Consistency.” Dave was “consistent” throughout the race, his first 400 metres and last 400 metres both took around 52 seconds, in fact, each of his 200 metres were around 26 seconds. As you can see in the clip, some of the athletes went all out at the start and were burned out towards the end. Crowd favourite Yevgeniy Arzhanov collapsed at the end.
I often think about what Dave would have gone through during the race. After months of prep and an almost career-ending injury, he was dead last after the first 100m, how much mental strength it might have taken to go through that is something only he knows. You too as a CAT aspirant might find yourself at such points during your prep, where it will seem as if any effort is futile as everyone else has raced ahead of you. In those moments, I want you to remember, that Dave Wottle was consistent. He did not see probable victory all the way to the last 10m of the race, but he did not give up. He kept running, and you should keep preparing!
Remember this especially when observing your progress in mocks. Dave as you can see in the clip was consistent, he did not let the progress of others bog him down, your mock percentiles will go on a roller coaster journey, but remember, everyone has their own pace, own timeline, and own capability. All you must do is make a plan and stick to it religiously. I have here a picture of my study table where I made a note of my progress in mocks, note how much variation there is in the percentile as well as score.
A snapshot of the whiteboard on my study table 2 days before CAT, I had taken a total of 15 ranked mocks.
No matter how much variation you observe in the marks, rank etc. One thing that I had put in constantly to get a 99.80 %ile, was the effort. Make a timetable, and stick to it, you only have to crack this exam once, and then never look back.