>ETA--Having attended the Olympic Training Center around age 16, I can't tell you how depressing it was to see 20 and 30-something athletes living in the dorms

>ETA--Having attended the Olympic Training Center around age 16, I can't tell you how depressing it was to see 20 and 30-something athletes living in the dorms there, striving for their moment of glory while everyone else was out having fun, working, starting families, etc. I look back at that as the moment I made a very conscious choice to focus on having a career. Olympic sports aren't pro sports, you aren't getting endorsement deals unless you're in one of the "popular" sports like swimming or downhill skiing. I dunno. the unpopular sports always seemed more interesting to me. I'm imagining a bunch of 'sports nerds' hanging out together, People who aren't best in the world, but within the top 100 within their sport. All hanging out with other people who are just as obsessed with the same obscure sport, doing their thing without the constant public intrusion that would come with being that good at, say, baseball. It sounds kinda neat, really. Although a lot of that, I imagine, is just that it would be pretty great to be in that kind of physical condition. I mean, I imagine everyone there was in the top ten thousand humans if you ordered us by physical fitness. You probably have a much better idea of what it is to be that fit than I do, and maybe it's not actually all that great... but from where I stand here in my late '30s, teetering on the edge of obesity, it sounds pretty great.