"Sport: Get Involved" a preface by Alex Zanardi

Written By Alex Zanardi

Translated by Stefania Sorvino

What is well-being? Luck, success, money or rather knowing how to satisfy your soul by really understanding what to do in life? If this is the answer we should ask ourselves clearly because that answer happens to make decisions that we then reconsider after some time. We see others running towards a goal and afraid of leaving something important behind us we try to engage the group without even asking ourselves where the group is going!

If running is not the most pleasant aspect of moving towards a horizon... if the great goal is nothing more than a good excuse to do something we love, you know? Running is very tiring! I think you understand what I mean.

I am a privileged person, someone who has had more than one occasion as a gift from life. And, I admit, maybe it is thanks to this, that I understood one fundamental thing: for me getting into a racing car or a handbike was not important to go out and win; I won eventually but because I understood that I really wanted to get on it.

Today's world, hyper-technological, consumerist and constantly evolving, has branched out to the point that it can even scare a boy who is starting his path. The possibilities are many for that boy, and with too much, can also struggle to understand what to dream. How can you succeed then? And we, who have somehow already passed from there, what tools do we have to urge our children to be curious, to explain to them that however difficult it may be to recognize their own path, it will be the very belonging to that path which will reveal how inside each of us always has enough talent to succeed?

Pointing to positive examples can be the answer that inspires them. And no matter the scope I am sure this surrounds us. For those who work hard and not just in sport but in many of our relationships and also in the great vocations shown by some people. Because, after all, everything done to the best of one's abilities represents a great sporting gesture that has the power to inspire us. The secret to realizing this is knowing how to look. 

It sounds simple, but it's not.

It takes equal talent in our eyes to recognize it in things or in whom we look to see enough inspiration to change our own lives. If this is the intent I believe that sport facilitates the task that something obvious happens on this ground every Sunday. And we, with a few white hairs on our heads, can help our kids decipher the message that many athletes pass on to us when they cross a finish line in front of everyone. What does not lie in the success achieved in that moment, because it only adds to the good that has wonderfully colored their path.

PASSION is the word. 

That wonderful thing that makes it happen and that can bless our life if we allow it to lead it.