Canadian Olympian motivates students at Glendale Elementary

By Mathew White

EDMONTON — Edmonton’s own Canadian Olympic gymnast Brandon O’Neill gave a motivational speech to an excited group of  students at Glendale Elementary School Friday.

“We want to have our students realize that the future is theirs and give them ideas and inspiration for hope,” said Les Hansen, principal of Glendale School.  “Set a goal and you can achieve it.”

Fresh off his return from the Chinese nationals, O’Neill has been giving motivational speeches to students all over the Edmonton area this week as part of the My Communities Olympic Speakers Series.  The speeches are meant to convey perseverance, reaching personal goals and achieving your best.

“The main point I try to get out of it is goal setting,” said O’Neill.  “You got to try and set goals and go for your dream.”

Believe it or not, even after competing for a world-wide audience, O’Neill still gets nervous giving speeches.

“It was something I obviously wasn’t comfortable with at the time, but I wanted to try and get into it and hopefully it would get a little better as it got along,” said O’Neill.  “I’ve done a few of them now and I’m starting to feel more and more comfortable.”

O’Neill started Friday morning with a brief introduction of himself and his sport.  He explained to the students how gymnastics works at a professional level, and mentioned some of the metals he’s won throughout his career.

After that he gave the students the visuals they needed with a short video demonstrating the sport, which even had a couple clips of O’Neill himself.  The children couldn’t help but oo and awe as the gymnasts twisted and twirled.

‘Set backs and sacrifice‘

After the video, O’Neill moved onto the real meat of his speech: set backs and sacrifice.  He explained to the students how much dedication is really needed to reach this height within a sport, and all the obstacles you have to overcome to get there.

“If you are to succeed in sports, you have to sacrifice,” said O’Neill.  “If you want to be the best, you have to put the time in.”

Having to push on and persevere is something O’Neill knows all to well.  In 2008, he broke his ankle mere days before the Beijing Olympics, but competed anyways.  And after tearing his knee ligament in 2010, he was forced to have surgery, but has since continued on his path, letting nothing stand in his way.

“It might not always go as well as you would like it in life, but if there’s something you enjoy doing and want to do with your life, keep working at it.”

Although he just got back to Edmonton last week, O’Neill will once again be leaving on Monday, this time heading to Prince Edward Island to compete in the Canadian nationals.

And despite the 2012 Olympics quickly approaching, O’Neill says they’re still just too far away to focus on.

“We can’t even think about the Olympics now, not until Worlds,” said O’Neill.

“I’ve learnt over the years too, you just got to focus on one competition at a time.”