Small and simple things — going from good to great

Following a fourth-place finish at the Vancouver Games in 2010, Noelle Pikus-Pace was devastated. After traveling at speeds of 90-miles per hour down a mile-long track and accumulating her 4 race-times, she missed an Olympic medal by 0.1 of a second.

The thing is, Noelle had followed her training program diligently. She had studied the track and knew how exactly she needed to steer her sled down the course. What could she have possibly missed? Fourth place was good enough, but it was far from great.

The following summer, Noelle decided to watch her Olympic race for the first time. It was then that she made a crushing realization — her shoelaces were dragging the entire way down the mile-long track and thus impacted her time, costing her an Olympic medal.

To say the least, she learned from this setback and went on to reach the Olympic podium 4 years later.

Through Noelle’s experience, we stand to glean the importance of how the small and simple decisions we make within our lives can help us to move toward or away from our goals. And it is those small and simple things that will take us from good to great.