What image comes to mind when you hear the word “champion?”

The athlete in me sees an Olympic gold medalist. Or the winners of the World Series. Or a state championship team.

In other words, the athlete in me sees a person or team who wins and experiences that intoxicating feeling of conquering the competition. Of being the best.

At least that’s what I used to see. Until I made the transition from athlete to coach and from jogger to marathoner.

When I first started coaching high school softball, I saw a team of athletes that I wanted to turn into champions. To me, that meant beating the competition. Winning games.

But I had a problem. I saw them as athletes, competitors who wanted to be pushed to their limits to win games. So I pushed them. And they resisted. Because I didn’t take the time to figure out who they were as people. I didn’t take the time to figure out what they wanted to accomplish that season.

It was a frustrating, miserable, losing season at the end of which I decided I never wanted to coach again.

Those girls didn’t become champions because I didn’t understand what a champion really is.

I stayed away from coaching high school for two years.

In the meantime, I ran a marathon.

Deciding to run the marathon was difficult because I knew with my super slow Schaefer speed that I had no chance of winning. None. Why would I want to compete in something where the chances of me winning were zero? It didn’t make sense to me to want to run. Because I wanted to be a champion. I wanted to win.

Then at the end of one of my training runs, it hit me. I wasn’t competing against the other runners. I was competing against me. As long as I finished that marathon, I would beat me. Because 26.2 miles was a longer distance than I had ever run before. And because it was a dream of mine.

Therefore, a champion is someone who pursues a dream or goal or objective-no matter how big or how small. A champion is someone who focuses on the process of becoming a winner rather than actually winning.

Bonnie Jean Schaefer is a writer and sports performance coach. She teaches young athletes how to think, perform and act like champions. Visit http://www.childrenintochampions.com for more information.