It was October 13, 2012, a day that I will never forget. I was on my bike, pushing up what seemed like a never-ending barren hill. And it wasn't just any hill: it was a 15-mile climb up to a town called Hawi on the Big Island of Hawaii. And it wasn't just any ride: it was at the Ironman World Championship. I can still feel my muscles burning. I was struggling, tired and dehydrated, as I could feel the heat emanating from the asphalt, measuring almost 98 degrees. I was near the halfway point of the bike portion of one of the most prestigious, longest, single-day endurance race events in the world.
2012 年 10 月 13 日, 我永遠無法忘記的一天。 我騎著自行車,努力騎上 似乎無止盡的荒蕪山丘。 它不是任何山丘, 而是條 15 英哩的上坡路, 通往叫做哈維的小鎮, 位在夏威夷的大島上。 那並不是任何乘騎之旅, 而是鐵人三項世界錦標賽。 我還能感覺到我的肌肉在燃燒。 我在掙扎、累壞了、脫水了, 我可以感覺到熱度, 柏油路散發的熱達華氏 98 度 (攝氏 37 度)。 我已快完成一半的自行車程, 這是世界上最有名、最長的 單日耐力賽事之一。
Every year, during my childhood, I watched this very race on TV in our family living room. I sat next to my dad on our 1970s-style orange and brown sofa, and I remember being in utter awe at how these athletes pushed themselves to their limit in this grueling race. And just so you don't get the wrong idea, my family members weren't just spectators. They were incredibly athletic, and I always participated from the sidelines, cheering on my three siblings or handing out water at local races. I remember wanting so badly to be able to compete, but I couldn't.
在我兒時,每一年, 我會在家中的客廳看 這場比賽的電視轉播。 我和爸爸一起坐在一張 七〇年代風格的橘褐色沙發上, 我還記得我感到完全的敬畏, 佩服這些運動員如何 在這場累垮人的比賽中 把自己推向極限。 為了避免各位誤會, 我的家人並不只是旁觀的觀眾。 他們在運動的表現很出色, 而我總是在邊線旁參與他們的比賽, 為我的三位手足加油,或是 在當地比賽中遞水給他們。 我記得我好渴望自己 也能去競賽,但我不能。
Even though I couldn't play sports, I decided to be active in my community. I volunteered at the local hospital in high school. In college, I interned at the White House, studied abroad in Spain and backpacked through Europe all by myself with my leg braces and crutches. Upon graduating, I moved to New York City for a job in management consulting, earned an MBA, got married and now have a daughter.
雖然我無法參與運動競賽, 我決定要在社區中做個活躍的人。 高中時,我自願在當地醫院做志工。 大學時,我在白宮實習, 到西班牙讀書, 一個人當背包客在歐洲旅行了一年, 全靠我的腳支架和拐杖。 畢業後,我搬到紐約市, 去做一份管理諮詢的工作, 取得了企管碩士學位,結了婚, 現在有個女兒。
(Applause)
(掌聲)
At age 28, I was introduced to the sport of hand-cycling, and then triathlon, and by luck, I met Jason Fowler, an Ironman World Champion, at a camp for athletes with disabilities. And like me, he competed in a wheelchair. And with his encouragement, at age 34, I decided to go after Kona. The Kona, or Hawaii Ironman is the oldest Iron-distance race in the sport, and if you're not familiar, it's like the Super Bowl of triathlon. And the Ironman, for a wheelchair athlete like me, consists of a 2.4-mile open-water swim in the Pacific Ocean, a 112-mile hand cycle ride in lava fields -- now, that sounds exotic, but it's not as scenic as it sounds, and it's pretty desolate -- and then you top it off with a marathon, or a 26.2-mile run in 90-degree heat using a racing wheelchair. That's right, it's a total distance of 140.6 miles using just your arms in less than 17 hours. No female wheelchair athlete had ever completed the race because of the strict, seemingly impossible cutoff times. And so there I was, putting it all out on the line. And when I finally reached the top of that 15-mile climb, I was discouraged. There was no way I was going to make that swim in my time limit of 10 and a half hours, because I was almost two hours off pace. I had to make the agonizing decision to quit. I removed my timing chip, and I handed it over to a race official. My day was done.
28 歲時,我接觸手搖車運動, 接著是鐵人三項, 運氣很好,我遇到了 鐵人世界冠軍傑森佛勒, 地點是在一個身心障礙運動員營。 他跟我一樣,是用輪椅來競賽。 因為他的鼓舞,在 34 歲時, 我決定要挑戰 Kona。 Kona,又稱夏威夷鐵人錦標賽, 是運動界中最古老的 鐵人長距離比賽, 如果你跟這個不熟, 那就像是鐵人三項的超級盃。 對於像我這種輪椅運動員, 鐵人賽的內容包括 2.4 英哩的 太平洋開放水域長泳, 112 英哩火山熔岩地形的 手搖車賽── 聽起來很有異國風情, 但景色並沒有聽起來那麼秀麗, 還挺荒蕪的── 最後,再以馬拉松結束, 那是華氏 90 度高溫下的 26.2 英里路程, 用賽車輪椅。 是的,總距離 140.6 英哩, 通通都要靠手臂, 要在 17 小時內完成。 從來沒有任何一位女性 輪椅運動員完成過這項比賽, 因為這嚴格的時間限制, 幾乎是不可能達成。 我參加了, 賭上了我的全力。 當我終於到達了那 15 英哩爬坡的頂點時, 我洩氣了。 我不可能在十個半小時的時間限制內 完成游泳項目, 因為我幾乎已經落後了兩個小時。 我得要做出痛苦的決定: 放棄。 我取出了我的計時晶片, 把它交給工作人員。 我的那一天結束了。
My best friend Shannon and my husband Shawn were waiting at the top of Hawi to drive me back to town. And on my way back to town, I began to cry. I had failed. My dream of completing the Ironman World Championship was crushed. I was embarrassed. I felt like I'd messed up. I worried about what my friends, my family and people at work would think of me. What was I going to put on Facebook?
我最好的朋友香儂和我先生尚恩 在哈維的頂上等著,把我載回鎮上。 返回鎮上的路上,我開始哭泣。 我失敗了。 我想完成鐵人三項世界錦標賽的夢想 被粉碎了。 我很不好意思。 我覺得我搞砸了。 我擔心朋友、家人、同事 會怎麼看我。 我要在臉書上寫什麼?
(Laughter)
(笑聲)
How was I going to explain to everyone that things didn't go the way I had assumed or planned?
我要如何向大家解釋 實際狀況不如我所假設或計畫的?
A few weeks later I was talking to Shannon about the Kona "disaster," and she said this to me: "Minda, big dreams and goals can only be realized when you're ready to fail." I knew I had to put that failure behind me in order to move forward, and it wouldn't be the first time that I had faced insurmountable odds.
幾週後,我和香儂 談到了這場 Kona「災難」, 她這樣對我說: 「敏達,只有當你準備好失敗時, 才有可能實現大夢想和大目標。」 我知道我得要放下那次失敗, 才能再向前走。 那並不是我第一次必須 面對無法克服的勝算。
I was born in Bombay, India, and just before my first birthday, I contracted polio, which left me paralyzed from the hips down. Unable to care for me, my birth mother left me at an orphanage. Fortunately, I was adopted by an American family, and I moved to Spokane, Washington just shortly after my third birthday. Over the next few years, I underwent a series of surgeries on my hips, my legs and my back that allowed me to walk with leg braces and crutches.
我生在印度孟買, 在我一歲生日前夕, 我得了小兒麻痺, 使我臀部以下全都癱瘓。 我的生母無法照顧我, 把我留在孤兒院。 幸運的是,我被一個美國家庭領養, 我搬到華盛頓州的史坡堪市, 那時我三歲多一點。 接下來的幾年, 我經歷了一連串的手術, 髖部、腿部、背部都動過手術, 才讓我能夠用腳支架和拐杖來走路。
As a child, I struggled with my disability. I felt like I didn't fit in. People stared at me all the time, and I was embarrassed about wearing a back brace and leg braces, and I always hid my chicken legs under my pants. As a young girl, I thought thick, heavy braces on my legs did not look pretty or feminine. Among my generation, I am one of the very few individuals in the US who are living with paralysis by polio today. Many people who contract polio in developing countries do not have access to the same medical care, education, or opportunities like I have had in America. Many do not even live to reach adulthood. I have the humbling knowledge that, had I not been adopted, I most certainly wouldn't be in front of you today. I may not even be alive.
小時候,我為我的殘疾所苦。 我覺得我無法融入。 人們總是會盯著我看, 對於穿戴著背架和腳支架, 我感到很不好意思, 我總是用長褲把我細瘦的腿藏起來。 進入青春期時,我認為 我腳上的粗重支架 看起來不美麗或女性化。 在我那個世代,美國已經 很少有小兒麻痺患者了, 而我是其中之一。 在開發中國家,許多 感染到小兒麻痺的人 沒辦法取得和我一樣的 醫療照護、教育, 或是機會,我在美國才能得到這些。 許多人甚至沒辦法活到成年。 我所知道的事讓我謙卑: 如果我沒有被領養, 今天就非常有可能 不會站在各位面前, 甚至不見得還能活著。
All of us, in our own lives, may face seemingly insurmountable goals. I want to share with you what I learned when I tried again.
我們所有人,在自己的人生中, 都可能會面對似乎不能克服的目標。 我想要和各位分享,當我 再次嘗試時,我學到了什麼。
One year after my first attempt, on a sunny Saturday morning, my husband Shawn dumped me into the ocean at the Kona Pier and, with 2,500 of my closest friends and competitors, we started swimming as that cannon went off promptly at 7am. I focused on one stroke at a time, staying in between bodies, counting my strokes -- one, two, three, four -- and lifting my head to sight every so often just so I wouldn't get too off track. And when I finally reached the shoreline, Shawn picked me up, and he carried me out of the water. I was so stunned and thrilled when Shawn had told me I had managed a one-hour-and-43-minute swim time.
我初次嘗試的一年後, 一個晴朗的星期六早晨, 我先生尚恩 把我丟到 Kona 碼頭的海洋裡, 另外還有 2,500 位 我最親密的朋友及競賽者, 早上七點砲聲準時響起, 我們就開始游泳。 我專注在每一次的划水, 待在人與人之間, 數著我划了幾下── 一、二、三、四── 我偶爾會把頭抬起來看一下, 確保我沒有偏離軌道。 當我終於抵達海岸線時, 尚恩把我拉起來,他抱我離開水。 我目瞪口呆且相當激動, 因為尚恩告訴我, 我完成游泳的時間 是 1 小時 43 分鐘。
On to the bike segment. I had eight hours and 45 minutes to complete the 112-mile bike course. I broke up the course in seven- to 10-mile segments in my mind just to reduce the enormity of the race. The first 40 miles, they clipped by as we benefited from a little tail wind. By 4pm, I had made it to mile 94, and I did the math and I realized I was in serious time jeopardy because I had 18 miles to go and less than 90 minutes, and that included a few sizable hill climbs. I was stressed out, and I was scared that I wasn't going to make that time cutoff again. At this point, I pushed my internal voice aside that said, "This hurts. Quit." And I told myself, "Minda, you better focus. Focus on what you can control, and that is your attitude and your effort." I resolved to be OK being uncomfortable, and I told myself, "Push harder, forget about the pain, and keep that laser focus."
接著進入自行車的部分。 我有 8 小時 45 分可以完成 112 英哩的自行車路線。 我在腦中把這段路切割成 7 到 10 英哩的區段, 才不會覺得這場比賽那麼長。 因為順風, 前 40 英哩一下就過去了。 下午四點時,我已經 到了第 94 英哩, 我計算了一下,我發現 我的時間非常吃緊, 因為我還有 18 英哩路, 時間剩不到 90 分鐘, 而且還有幾段蠻長的上坡路。 我感到很有壓力,我很害怕, 我又沒辦法在時間內完成了。 這時候,我把我內在的聲音 推到一邊,那個聲音在說: 「這好痛苦。放棄吧。」 我告訴我自己: 「敏達,你最好專心點。 專注在你能控制的事, 也就是你的態度和盡力而為。」 我下定決心,再不舒服也沒關係, 我告訴自己:「再用力點, 忘掉痛苦, 保持那超級專注的注意力。」
For the next 90 minutes, I cranked as though my life depended on it. And when I rolled into town, I heard on the loudspeaker, "Minda Dentler is one of the last competitors to make the bike cutoff." I did it!
接下來的 90 分鐘,我拼命加速, 好像攸關生死一樣。 當我騎到鎮上時, 我從大聲的廣播聽到, 「敏達丹勒,是最後幾位達成 自行車截止時間的參賽者之一。」 我辦到了!
(Applause)
(掌聲)
By only three minutes.
只差三分鐘就沒過。
(Laughter)
(笑聲)
It was 5:27pm, and I had been racing for 10-and-a-half hours. The first 10 miles of the run went pretty quickly, as I was so excited to finally pass people with my three wheels to their two feet. The sun quickly went down, and I found myself pulling up to the bottom of Palani hill, looking straight into a half-mile hill that looked like Mt. Everest at mile 124 of the race. My friends and family were ready at their stations to talk me up that hill. I was struggling, tired, desperately gripping those rims just so I wouldn't tip backwards. When I finally reached the top of that hill, I turned left onto a very lonely 15-mile stretch onto the Queen K Highway, totally exhausted. I pressed on, focusing on one push at a time. By 9:30pm, I made that final right-hand turn onto Ali'i Drive. I heard the crowd's roar, and I was overcome with emotion.
那時是下午 5 點 27 分, 我已經比賽了十個半小時了。 賽跑的部分,前 10 英哩很快速。 因為我很興奮我終於超過了別人, 我用三個輪子,超過他們的兩條腿。 太陽很快就下山了, 我發現自己停在帕拉尼山丘的底部, 直直看向那半英哩的山丘, 它看起就像聖母峰一樣, 那是賽程中的第 124 英哩。 我的朋友家人在他們的駐地準備好, 要說服、鼓勵我爬上山丘。 我很掙扎,累壞了, 死命地抓住輪子的邊緣 以免向後傾倒。 當我終於抵達山丘頂, 向左轉,進入非常寂寞的 15 英哩 賽道,上了 Queen K 公路, 我完全精疲力竭了。 加緊繼續前進,專注在一次推一下, 到了晚上九點半, 我過了最後的右彎, 進入 Ali'i Drive 大街。 我聽見群眾在吼叫,我的情緒高漲。
I crossed that finish line.
我越過了終點線。
(Applause)
(掌聲)
(Applause ends)
(掌聲終止)
And my final time was 14 hours and 39 minutes. For the first time in the 35-year history, a female wheelchair athlete completed the Ironman World Championship.
我的完賽時間是 14 小時 39 分。 在 35 年的歷史上,第一次 有女性輪椅運動員 完成了鐵人三項世界錦標賽。
(Applause)
(掌聲)
(Applause ends)
(掌聲終止)
And it wasn't just any female athlete. It was me.
而且不是任何一個女性運動員。 是我呢。
(Laughter)
(笑聲)
A paralyzed orphan from India. Against all odds, I achieved my dream, and through this very personal commitment to myself, I slowly realized that completing the Ironman was about more than conquering Kona. It was about conquering polio and other disabling but preventable diseases, not only for myself, but for the millions of children who have been and still will be afflicted by vaccine-preventable diseases. Today, we are closer than ever to eliminating one of those diseases everywhere in the world.
來自印度的癱瘓孤兒。 我衝破重重困難,完成了我的夢想, 透過這項對我自己的個人承諾, 我慢慢了解到,完成鐵人三項 並不只是戰勝了 Kona。 是戰勝了小兒麻痺, 以及其他會造成殘疾, 但可以避免的疾病, 不只是為了我自己, 也為了那些被可透過疫苗避免之疾病 所影響且會繼續 被影響的數百萬孩子。 現今,我們比過去 更有機會能把那些疾病之一 從世界各地消除。
In the mid-1980s, polio once paralyzed more than 350,000 children a year in more than 125 countries. That amounted to a staggering 40 cases an hour. By contrast, so far this year, the last endemic countries have reported a total of only 12 cases. Since 1988, more than 2.5 billion children have been immunized against polio, and an estimated 16 million children, who otherwise would have been paralyzed like me, are walking. Despite this incredible progress, we know that until it's eradicated, polio remains a very real threat, especially to children in the poorest communities of the world. It can reemerge in some of the most remote and dangerous places, and from there, it can spread.
在八〇年代中期,每年有超過 35 萬名孩童因為小兒麻痺而癱瘓, 遍及超過 125 個國家。 那等同於每小時有 40 件案例發生,很驚人。 相對的,今年到目前為止, 還有小兒麻痺流行的最後幾個國家, 目前只回報了 12 件案例。 1988 年起,有超過 25 億孩童 接種了小兒麻痺的疫苗, 估計如果沒這麼做的話, 有 1,600 萬孩童本來會像我一樣癱瘓, 但他們現在都在走路。 儘管有這樣驚人的進展, 我們知道,除非小兒麻痺被根絕, 否則它仍然是個非常真實的威脅, 特別是對在世界上 最貧窮之社區中的孩童來說。 它有可能會在最偏遠 及危險的地方重新出現, 它可能會從那裡擴散。
And so this is my new Ironman: to end polio. And I am reminded every day, when I look at my two-and-a-half-year-old daughter Maya. She is able to climb a ladder in the park, push her scooter or kick a ball across the grass. Almost everything that I see her do at her age reminds me of what I could not do at that age. And when she was two months old, I took her to get her first polio vaccine. And when the doctor came in the room to prepare the shot, I asked him if I could take a picture to document the moment. When we left the room, I could feel my eyes welling up with tears. I cried the entire way home. It was in that moment that I realized that my daughter's life would be very different from mine. She will never be faced with the crippling disability of polio, because a vaccine was available, and I chose to get her immunized. She can do anything she wants, as can each of you.
所以,這是我的新鐵人錦標賽: 終結小兒麻痺。 每天,當我看著兩歲半的女兒瑪雅時, 都會提醒我這一點。 她能夠攀爬公園裡的梯子、 推她的踏板車,或是把球踢過草坪。 我看著她在這年齡 所做的幾乎每一件事, 都提醒我,我在那個 年齡時無法做到。 當她兩個月大時, 我帶她去施打第一劑小兒麻痺疫苗。 當醫生進診療室準備施打時, 我問他,我能否拍張照片, 記錄這個時刻。 當我們離開時, 我可以感覺到我的眼睛泛著淚水。 回家的路上我哭個不停。 在那一刻,我才了解到, 我女兒的人生會和我的非常不同。 她永遠不會需要面臨 小兒麻痺帶來的殘疾, 因為疫苗是可以取得的, 而我選擇讓她免疫了。 她能做任何她想做的事, 你們每個人也都能。
(Laughter)
(笑聲)
Now I'd like to leave you all with one question: what is your Ironman?
最後我想留一個問題給各位: 你的鐵人錦標賽是什麼?
Thank you.
謝謝。
(Applause)
(掌聲)