Sportbiographien

Austin 'Clarence' Farrar saw an opportunity for innovation in almost everything. Although not a well known public figure, he was known and respected by those who met him and worked with him. His work on dinghy design and building, and subsequently as one of the leading sailmakers of his day, stays with us today. His work on the design of spinnakers and wing rigs is still current and many of today's sailmakers learnt the trade under Austin.Coming from a family where invention was encouraged, Austin was fortunate to be yacht and dinghy racing in the heyday of the 1930s. He worked on the design of cutting edge offshore racers and developed torpedo nets to guard ships during the war. Later he was the most successful of the designers of the International 14 class and Seahorse Sails became synonymous with excellence and design development. This book tells the story of a fascinating man.

In this personal look at Bear Bryant, the legendary college coach, dozens of his contemporaries, former players, childhood friends, family, competitors, opponents, and his ""boys"" offer in their own words their favorite memories of this man they loved so much. Illustrations.

Be inspired by the life of a late blooming world champion, with coloured photos, and some of Earl's pertinent poetry, in 20 entertaining chapters describing his life from 1929 to 2018. Highlights in this book are Earl's:- Valuable detailed running workouts and methods from age 57 to age 88.- Experiences at 17 World Masters Championships from 1987 to 2014. (But more to come.) - Quotations and spiritual reflections (e.g., gratitude, helping others, love, empathy, etc.). - Anti-aging lifestyle and his secret to athletic success- aging slower than his rivals. - Thirty-five pioneering years in the Canadian (CANDU) nuclear power industry. - Detailed descriptions of interesting friends, characters and five legendary athletic friends.Compared to Earl's anti-aging lifestyle, and lifestyle descriptions herein of his legendary athletic friends the late Ed Whitlock and Olga Kotelko ...it may appear like your daily habits are not productive-or you are not making the most of your remaining valuable time. This book is bound to increase your motivation and rejuvenate your dreams.

No sporting venue has been subject to more lies, distortions and half-truths than the Berlin Olympics of 1936. In this diligently researched and annotated work, the author sets the record straight. The first matter tackled by the author is the international campaign to boycott the Games. This was a failure because, as the President of the International Olympic Committee said at the time, it had no significant support among the athletes themselves. In fact, despite the US led boycott campaign, more nations than ever, 12 more (or 32% more) participated than in the previous Games at Los Angeles.New ideas adopted at the Games, which became standard features of future Games, are highlighted: the Olympic Torch, the Olympic Bell and the direct relay of television. The traditional Olympic Salute is also discussed, though it has now been effectively banned from the Olympics by the tyranny of political correctness.Controversies relating to the following participants are investigated: Gretel Bergmann, the Jewish athlete dropped from the German team less than three weeks after equalling the German women's high jump record; Dora Ratjen, the German high jumper later exposed (by the Germans) as a man; two Jewish sprinters replaced by the US team (by two African-Americans) in the men's relay; and the Peruvian football team, required to replay a match with Austria.In particular, the author deals at length with the Jesse Owens saga, establishing that it was President Roosevelt, not Hitler, who snubbed the great athlete and showing that African-American athletes were treated far better in Germany than in their own country.Includes over 60 original photographs.

The Fencers is the third volume in a trilogy of autobiographical Cold War Escape stories. It is both an immigrant's narrative of seeking a better life and a brighter future and a sports memoir focusing on two Olympic fencers, one representing Canada, the other Romania. Most of all, it is the account of the author's friendship with Paul Szabó, a Romanian-Hungarian epée fencer, Szabó's love for a young woman he married and her tragic death. In Romania, the country Paul represented in the 1976 Olympics, Nicolae Ceaüescu was then President. Mismanagement, rampant corruption, mass surveillance, brutality and human rights abuses were rampant. Ceaüescu's Stalinist secret police, the Securitate, was particularly notorious for purges, oppression and restrictions of freedom of the almost two million Hungarians, like Szabó, who had lived in Romania for centuries. And it was in this context that Paul, only twenty-one at the time takes the difficult decision to stay in Canada, with the prospect of never seeing his parents and homeland again. He approaches his friend, Tatrallyay, who against all odds helps him defect to Canada and start a new life in his chosen country. The Fencers is an exciting true story of courage, friendship, love, happiness, success and tragedy.

Black Man vs. The World: Jack Johnson's Trials, Tribulations, and Triumphs, by Adam J. Pollack, tells the complete story of Jack Johnson, the first black man to fight for and win the world heavyweight championship. In a thorough, detailed, and unique fashion, Johnson's life and fights are recounted based on multiple local next-day primary sources, archival documents, as well as a multitude of rare photographs, cartoons, and advertisements. You will follow his path from a poverty-stricken struggling unknown, to contender battling against the color line, lobbying for a title shot which he had earned but for his race, all the way to the championship, his reign, and the great efforts to find a white fighter capable of dethroning him. Throughout, both black and white-owned newspapers offer their plethora of perspectives and substantial context about race, both inside and outside of the ring, better enabling the reader to understand Johnson's struggles and symbolic significance both to whites and blacks throughout the world. Like never before, boxing fans, sociologists, and historians will obtain knowledge and insight into Jack Johnson's life and world from which he emerged and endured. The book includes racial incidents, lynchings and riots, analysis of the significant racial impact of Johnson's achievements, religious and racial objections and arguments, and legal battles and obstacles Johnson and the sport of boxing faced, including fight film bans, his criminal trial for violation of the White-Slave Traffic Act (based on the actual trial transcript), and even battle for the right to defend his crown in England. This is a revised and condensed version of In the Ring With Jack Johnson: Parts I and II combined. Adam J. Pollack is a boxing judge and referee, attorney, and member of the Boxing Writers Association of America.

In Painted Mountains, Stephen Venables - the first Briton to climb Everest without oxygen - details the stories of two very different expeditions: the first ascent of 6,000-metre Kishtwar-Shivling in the Indian Himalaya alongside Dick Renshaw, before embarking on an Indo-British Expedition led by Harish Kapadia to Rimo: the Painted Mountain.

 I grew up in Jamaica in the district of Burnt Savannah, St. Elizabeth, between Lacovia and Mountainside. That’s about a twenty-minute drive from Santa Cruz, St. Elizabeth. Life was tough for me as a child. While we lived in poverty, my parents did the best they could for my siblings and me. I was often called names and ridiculed. Join me as I journey from the rocky playgrounds of Burnt Savannah to Boys Champs, Carifta Games, NCAA. The Olympic Games and winning a Commonwealth Games Gold medal. My experiences traveling the world will tell you how I finally realized that true happiness is not all about winning medals or accomplishing your goals. In pursuing athletic supremacy, I came to realize that it did not provide the satisfaction I envisioned. I finally understood that fame from athletic pursuit only left me wanting and empty at times. In the end, on the hills of the Acropolis, Athens, Greece. I finally discovered the truth about happiness.

"This book will touch the veins of your heart." -Bengie Molina, World Series Champion and author of New York Times Bestseller MolinaIn the mid-1990s, a band of baseball-loving boys from the small town of Chester, Illinois, on the banks of the Mississippi River, pursue their dreams of state and national championships. Their fathers, guards in the local penitentiary that houses some of the worst criminals in US history, are their coaches. One dream comes true-the other doesn't.This is the story of the dreams and of the town that made them possible. Filled with unforgettable anecdotes from perhaps the last (nearly) innocent age in America, The Sons of Chester recalls a childhood that in some sense is the twentieth century's version of Tom Sawyer and Huck Finn.

When she first began show jumping, Scarlet Rosalie Biedron didn''t enjoy the sport at all. It wasn''t until her love for horses and competitive spirit collided that Scarlet became a passionate show jumper. In fact, she not only loved the sport-she was enthralled. In a fascinating narrative, Biedron reveals how she transformed from a little girl who loved feeling the wind in her hair while riding her pony, Peaches, around the family farm into a show jumper who competed in her first major equestrian show at age twelve and shockingly won her class. While providing a chronological glimpse into the early years of her riding career, Biedron shares insight into what it was like to compete in a show with six different horses, gallop into the ring with a fearless attitude, and find the strength to move forward despite failures. By openly sharing her lessons learned, Biedron inspires others to find the courage to continue in the face of fear, get back up on the horse, and persevere through life''s greatest challenges. Fado is the true story of a girl''s exciting experiences and valuable lessons learned as she set out on a determined quest to become a competitive show jumper.

What Doesn't Kill You is not a football story. It's not a cancer story. It's a compelling thought provoking glimpse into the life of Lyle Bauer, a multiple Grey Cup Champion, CFL executive and a cancer survivor. What Doesn't Kill You is about fight, hope, inspiration and that a cancer diagnosis is not a death sentence. It is also about how profoundly everyone is changed when this beast kicks your door down without an invitation and turns lives upside down. The human spirit may be the most powerful energy on earth. The will to live, love, and survive makes us all miracles.

God's 1st String is a true story of unconditional love, life changing redemption and a joyous victory over the addiction fueled life of a professional linebacker. He had everything earthly you could want, but also alcohol and drug addictions which nearly cost him everything, including his soul. From a young age, she had always loved him through thick and thin, no matter what. And when God's power was unleashed during his redemption, there was nothing preventing a surrender which ensured his entrance into heaven after fighting cancer. But it was the joint battle this husband and wife sacrificed through a pure love for God and each other that will change your heart, deepen the way you view redemption and infuse the raw power of living in the moment into your life.

In a life as tough as his battles in the ring, Ron Lyle had already served hard time for second-degree murder before he started his amateur boxing career at the age of twenty-nine. After he turned pro, fans knew him as the man who had Muhammad Ali beat on the scorecards for ten rounds in a fight for the heavyweight title; as the man who fought George Foreman in a legendary brawl with four knockdowns that nearly saw Foreman knocked cold; and as the man who was arrested for murder a second time.Off the Ropes: The Ron Lyle Story is not your typical boxing biography, exploring not only the greatest era of heavyweights in boxing history, but also telling an equally compelling personal tale. Ron Lyle grew up in the Denver projects, one of nineteen children in a tight-knit, religious family. At twenty, he was convicted for a disputed gang killing and served seven and a half years at the Colorado State Penitentiary at Cañon City, where at one point he was nearly shanked to death, and where he learned to box before he was paroled in 1969.After a meteoric amateur career, he turned pro in 1971, and over the next six years established an outstanding professional record, which, in addition to the near misses against Ali and Foreman, included a brutal knockout win over one of the era s most feared fighters, big-punching Earnie Shavers.Then, in 1978, Lyle was indicted for murder a second time and, even though he was acquitted, his career was effectively over. The years that followed were filled with struggle, a captivating love story, and eventual redemption. Today, a youth center in Denver that he ran still bears his name.Off the Ropes: The Ron Lyle Story is the poignant, uplifting biography of a singular man.

Dieter Brock - The Birmingham Rifle is an intimate look into the life of the CFL Hall of Fame quarterback.With his notable, humble personality, Brock lays it all on the line and shares stories and insights about some of his behind-the-scenes moments in professional football and his life."Over the past number of years I've been encouraged to tell my story," said Brock. "But it wasn't easy. Robert got into stuff that I've never spoken about with anyone. He certainly didn't hold back when it came to pulling out some of those thoughts and moments. And to be honest, sometimes it was difficult reading what came out."Dieter Brock - The Birmingham Rifle is a story of perseverance, commitment and determination by bestselling author, Robert Allan Young, who wrote What Doesn't Kill You - The Lyle Bauer Story. Young sheds new light and never before comments on both the memorable performances Brock achieved as a football player and the trials had he faced along the way.From his days as a youth in Birmingham, Alabama, to walking away from Auburn, to a brilliant CFL Hall of Fame football career with the Winnipeg Blue Bombers and Hamilton Tiger Cats as well as the National Football League's L.A. Rams, the talented quarterback, Dieter Brock's love of football is what made him a legend."Back then, some people considered me as that Birmingham quarterback who played in Winnipeg," said Brock. "But this book is my opportunity to let everyone know, that after meeting Bud Riley in 1974, in my heart and mind, I was a Winnipeg Blue Bomber quarterback who just happened to live in Birmingham."Brock led the CFL in passing in three seasons; 1978, 1980 and 1982 and won his second of back-to-back Most Outstanding Player Awards after breaking Sam Etcheverry's all-time passing yardage record in '81,Inspiring, honest, and unapologetic, Dieter Brock, The Birmingham Rifle proves that the heart of a champion can never be measured.A portion of the proceeds support the Never Alone Foundation and the CFL Alumni Association.

John "Chief AJ" Huffer comes from a small town in Illinois, but throughout his lifetime he's become known worldwide for his marksmanship accomplishments. In The Exploits of Chief AJ, author Chuck Vaughan looks into the life of Chief AJ, a Native American, Christian, US Marine, and former bodybuilder who worked out with Jack LaLanne. In 1987, Chief AJ broke his first world record by throwing and shooting 40,060 wood blocks during eight days through pain and weather without a miss. He went on to break records with air rifles, long bows, a two-hundred-pound English war bow, and slingshots. Throughout his life, he stayed busy participating in different types of exhibition shooting. Chief AJ set up rifle camps and trained instructors to teach others to shoot the Chief AJ way. He always maintained his fitness and won fitness contests into his seventies. He's been to Hollywood and featured on shows like Discovery Channel's Top Shot and National Geographic's The Unbeatables. The Exploits of Chief AJ shares the story of this storyteller with a booming voice, now in his eighties, who found success in the world of marksmanship and shooting.www.chiefaj.com

Leroy "Satchel" Paige was a man of many words-boastful, brash, bitter, wise. Maybe I'll Pitch Forever is Paige's story in his own words. It is unadulterated Satchel, as pure as knee-high smoke over a book of matches.Satchel Paige is an American icon. It's hard to imagine a more dramatic life than his-from troubled kid, to young Negro Leagues star, to world-famous entertainer, to pioneer of the Major Leagues-a daredevil, showman, athlete extraordinaire. Paige played on dozens of teams, threw hundreds of no hitters, and had thousands of wild adventures-many of which actually happened!Some legends assign men their proper place in history. Others distort or exaggerate their worth. And once in a while the legend falls short; the man is greater than his accumulated history and acclaim. One such man is Satchel Paige.Maybe I'll Pitch Forever brings us up close to Satchel Paige. But part of him remains out of reach-evasive and enigmatic-a step ahead of the owners, the women, the opposition-inevitably beyond us. We will never fully grasp the legend or the man, never catch up to his fastball. In that way, Satchel Paige will pitch forever.

Baseball's best writer offers an extraordinarily candid and thorough exploration of the inner craft of pitching from one of the game's best, David Cone. Photos.

Action photos, Griffey's stats, and a list of career highlights are included in this biography of the charismatic outfielder. Matt Christopher explores the paths Griffey has traveled, the hardships he has overcome, and the highs and lows of his career.

Spanning the "Roaring Twenties," Prohibition and The Great Depression, Pile Driver is set in one of the most colorful periods of United States history. The story of Charles Berthold Fischer reveals hardship, humility and honor. Wrestling honestly in a dishonest era, Fischer, standing but 5'3", simultaneously held middleweight and light heavyweight world titles. Despite national sports figure status, Charlie was never ashamed to declare Butternut, Wisconsin, as his home. A man to whom many taller men looked up, Pile Driver is the untold story of an exceptional individual: Charles "Midget" Fischer.

Life is very complex and intricate. Every decision we make is made for a reason, either consciously or, more often than not, subconsciously. This includes your choice of school friends, your hobbies, your career pathway, your car (not just because it is the cheapest), your life partner or partners, the foods you like and don't like, and your tastes in music. These are decisions we have all made throughout our life, some we have been helped with and others we have made alone. Many people like sport; a majority of them are football supporters! They choose their team in many different ways, guided by their family or friends (I told my two children, "There are ninety-two teams in England. Support any one of the ninety-one of them. If you support the ninety-second, out you go.") or swayed by the media (more so these days). The team your friends follow and obviously the local team to where you live, that is usually the team you follow. When I decided that football would be my sport of choice, I had no family to guide me (no one was interested in football), and there was no local league team for the majority of my childhood. Birmingham was over twenty miles from Colwall, and Reading over twenty miles away from Newbury. And for the year I was in Nottingham, there were two teams to worry about, and so I had ninety-two league teams to choose from! Which one should I choose, and why? Because the one thing I realized even at a young age is that the team you choose is your team for life! That is unless you are a glory hunter, which certainly happened with some people I knew and went to school with in Nottingham. They were supporters of many different teams when I moved away from Nottingham in the mid-1970s, but when I came back to Nottingham in the early 1980s, they were all "loyal" Forest supporters!

How would you like to take charge of your mind and play your golf on your own terms? While most mental skills books for golf adopt a narrow focus on teaching skills that target performance, this book uses a holistic approach and provides tools to organize your thinking. You will learn to direct your mind with focused purpose to help you achieve your goals. Mind Hack Your Golf explores the 5P's of a great golf mind: 1. Preparation - explores how to create the right headspace by building self-awareness. The importance of a developing a growth versus fixed mindset, self-belief and self-discipline are emphasized and the steps required to set SMART process, performance and outcome goals are addressed. 2. Practice - discusses the importance of identifying individual learning preferences and introduces mindfulness practices, concentration techniques, self-talk and imagery that help build a mental skills tool kit for use during training and competition. 3. Performance - explores the impact of the conscious, sub-conscious and unconscious mind on performance and highlights the stages of skill development. The need to build self-trust and to be able to accept mistakes by managing ones emotions is emphasized. 4. Pursuit - explores the benefits of positive psychology and maintaining positive emotional states during competition. The benefits of identifying core values that can build character while promoting enjoyment and success are highlighted. 5. Progress - promotes an action-learning approach that emphasizes the need to keep things simple while focusing on specific aspects of practice. A continuous quality improvement process is described to facilitate development in areas of weakness.At the end of each section there are a number of reflective questions to guide the reader on areas to focus on and ways in which they can challenge themselves and their game.The tips, tricks, and strategies in this book provide a solid platform that will enable any golfer to create their own mind mastery. By implementing the tactics in this book you can take your golf game to the next level.

This is a story of pride, determination, cultural divides and deeply personal "Recollections". Experience those moments and exciting reports of Khan's professional sports career, then come away knowing Sharif Khan, the man.From 1968 to 1982, Sharif Khan won almost every major North American hardball squash tournament in the US, Canada, Mexico, the Caribbean and Central America, in addition to his World No. 4 ranking and his semifinal placing in the British Open international softball tournament during this same time period. Most of Khan's records have never and probably will never be matched even as the game itself is evolving.Born in Pakistan, raised in the simple but idyllic village of Nawakille, he was uprooted from his childhood at age 11 and sent to Millfield, a posh prep school in Somerset, UK. Sharif was on the path of the 'outlier' to become a great sports champion, feted as the eldest son of the Pakistani national sports hero Hashim Khan. But personal costs were high with separation and cultural confusion taking a toll on such a young life.

Jack McClelland: The Pride of Pittsburg is the first and only biography of Jack McClelland, the Smokey City's first boxing star. From 1895 to 1905, McClelland was one of the nation's most popular and talked-about boxers, appearing in the sports sections of newspapers across the country. He took on all-comers, and never drew the color line. At the 1904 Saint Louis World's Fair, McClelland fought and defeated world featherweight champion Abe Attell, only to have the championship ripped from his hands on a technicality. Legal troubles put Jack's career on hiatus, until he made a comeback in 1910. A man credited with bringing modern boxing to Pittsburgh, his name and story have vanished from the pages of history. That is, until now. Meticulously researched, using primary sources and interviews with the last surviving people that knew him, Vincent T. Ciaramella brings Jack McClelland back into the limelight for one last time. Filled with epic battles, shootouts with the police, race riots, broken families, and broken bones, Jack McClelland: The Pride of Pittsburg will make you question why you have never heard of him before. Vincent T. Ciaramella is a history teacher, a five-time published author, and the great-great grandson of Jack McClelland.

I was Born a Grown ManDavid E. Miller As Told by Melvin "Buck" DuncanMelvin "Buck" Duncan's love for baseball began when a local insurance agent in Centralia selected him for a youth baseball team."I was fourteen at the time, and this is when I fell head over heels with the game of baseball. Now don't get me wrong-I loved all sports, particularly boxing and football. The neighborhood kids were a ragtag group of youngsters who had no uniforms."This early start led to a professional career which brought accolades and achievement, despite obstacles in the 1940s and beyond.The problem was Melvin "Buck" Duncan was black.Negro baseball leagues have a deep historical significance. Racism and "Jim Crow" laws encouraged segregation of African Americans and whites. Arguably, the players on the Negro baseball leagues were some of the best ever. Even today, they are still recognized and honored for their wonderful contribution to baseball as a whole. It's safe to say that the Negro league owners had made a "gentleman's agreement" to keep blacks from playing in the major leagues. It was once said by Martin Luther King Jr., "[Segregation] gives the segregator a false sense of superiority, it gives the segregated a false sense of inferiority." David E. Miller is a native of Centralia, Illinois. He is a Cum Laude graduate from Benedict College (South Carolina) in the field of Criminal Justice. He also attained a Master's of Public Administration from Bowling Green State University (Ohio).Miller is currently working on an upcoming book entitled, Small Town Black, a semi-autobiographical account of his life growing up in a small Illinois community.Visit,AuthorDavidMiller.com

Now available in paperback, Tin Cup Dreams is the remarkable odyssey of self-taught golfer Esteban Toledo, a former boxer who overcame poverty and the wrong side of the tracks to make it through Q School and a make-or-break season on the PGA Tour. With uncommon grit and determination, Toledo finally triumphs after a 12 year quest that took him to the depths of despair.Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Michael D'Antonio gives a rare behind-the-scenes look at the PGA Tour while keeping readers on the edge of their seats with his chronicle of Toledo's struggles. Traditionally, golf was a dreamer's path to glory. Tin Cup Dreams shows that it still is.

Having lived a pretty wild and crazy life, hockey pro Miro Frycer faced death at 40. Now, after two transplants, he tells his fascinating story.A defector from communist Czechoslovakia, Frycer spent eight seasons in the NHL and played for the Quebec Nordiques, Toronto Maple Leafs, Detroit Red Wings and Edmonton Oilers. He was one of the most popular Leafs in the 1980s-partly because of his on-ice performances (he played in an NHL All-Star Game and was the highest-scoring Leaf in the 1985-86 season), partly because of his off-ice escapades, such as his personal war with hard-nosed coach John Brophy.With his typical sense of humor, he tells a story about the beautiful and ugly times with the Toronto Maple Leafs in the Harold Ballard era and remembers famous teammates Peter Stastny, Borje Salming, Steve Yzerman and Mark Messier. As always, he is outspoken and straightforward.Last but not least, My Wild Hockey Life includes Miro's recollection of his serious problems with alcohol in later years, as well as his new life after his liver transplant in 1999 and a recent kidney transplant in 2018. "A lot of the guys are dead already. Teammates, linemates ... and I'm still here after two transplants. I'm still fighting," he said at the time of publishing the book.***After battling a series of health problems, Miro Frycer died in April 2021 at 61.

Sweet, Sweet Addiction relates the story of a family man driven by his passion to learn tennis at an age when most professional players retire. George Newton is age 33 when he finds the game. He plunges into the sport and pursues it as if he is addicted. He dealt with the duplicity of balancing tennis practice against the demands of domestic and professional life. The story unfolds a progressive development of this tennis family. The Senior Newton advanced through years of competition to National and International Levels. His wife, Rossana evolved to become his main cheerleader, scorer-keeper and "coach". His sons Geoff and Greg obtained Athletic University Scholarships. The book concludes with the author changing careers from Education to Sports. Newton follows his passion and becomes a Certified Instructor. Consequently, he motivates hundreds of players to enjoy the sport. The book appeals to adults (no matter how old), to pursue their passion aggressively and live a fulfilled life