In the 3000-meter Steeplechase, Kenyan runner Abel Mutai was only a few meters from the finish line when he got confused with the signs and stopped. For some reason he thought he had finished the race!
Right behind him was Ivan Fernandez, from Spain.
“Keep going, you’re almost there!” Ivan’s voice shouted.
Abel didn’t know Spanish, however, and hesitated.
Ivan then came up behind Abel Mutai and instead guided him to victory.
A reporter later asked Ivan, “Why did you do that?”
Ivan replied, “My dream is for a community where we encourage each other to finish our races.”
The reporter insisted, “But why did you let the Kenyan win? You came in second.“
“I didn’t let him win,” Ivan answered. “He was ahead of me and was going to win. The race was already his.”
The reporter insisted and asked again, “But still, you could have won!”
Ivan looked at him and replied: “But what would be the merit of my victory? What would be the honour of that medal? What would my mom think of that?”
“If you wander off the road to the right or the left,
you will hear his voice behind you saying,
‘Here is the road. Follow it.'”
~ Isaiah 30:21 GNT
“Since we have so great a cloud of witnesses surrounding us,
let us also lay aside every encumbrance
and the sin which so easily entangles us,
and let us run with endurance
the race that is set before us…”
~ Hebrews 12:1 NASB