A REAL CLASS ACT

By now you have probably heard about Jimmie Johnson's hard hit into the wall at Phoenix during the third round of qualifying ... at 200 mph ... with no steering wheel!  Once he was released from the infield care center, the media was there to get his comments about what happened.  And much to Jimmie's credit, he decided to withhold his comments until he was able to talk to his team.

What he knew at that point was that he was coming out of turn one looking into the steering column of his car and he was holding the steering wheel in his hands, but it was not attached to that steering column.

What must have been running through his mind when he was asked what had happened?  What would I have said if I was the one in the same circumstances?  What about you?

It would have been so easy, and so understandable, for him to blame his crew!  "How hard is it to make sure the steering wheel is attached to the steering column?!"  "People on this team need to learn to do their damn job!"  Those are the kinds of comments I expected to hear.  But Jimmie, being the seasoned professional that he is, chose to wait until his crew had the chance to examine the car and determine exactly what had gone wrong before he made any comment.

Good thing, too!  Because what had happened was that Jimmie himself had screwed up!  He was the one who just didn't get the steering wheel on correctly.  What?!?!  This was a mindless, routine little thing that he has done probably tens of thousands of times over the year!  It couldn't be that!  But it was.  And Jimmie said so.  He didn't try to deflect the blame or minimize the seriousness of his screw-up.  He told us all exactly what HE did.  No one else.

And that is the kind of athlete our kids need to look up to - a man who is slow to blame others for things that happen to him, a man who is willing to accept the blame when things go wrong.  A real class act!