Wilma Rudolph quotes:

Never underestimate the power of dreams and the influence of the human spirit. We are all the same in this notion: The potential for greatness lives within each of us.

When the sun is shining I can do anything; no mountain is too high, no trouble too difficult to overcome.

But when you come from a large, wonderful family, there's always a way to achieve your goals.

I had a series of childhood illnesses... scarlet fever.... pneumonia.... Polio. I walked with braces until I was at least nine years old. My life wasn't like the average person who grew up and decided to enter the world of sports.

I loved the feeling of freedom in running, the fresh air, the feeling that the only person I'm competing with is me.

Winning is great, sure, but if you are really going to do something in life, the secret is learning how to lose. Nobody goes undefeated all the time. If you can pick up after a crushing defeat, and go on to win again, you are going to be a champion someday.

It doesn't matter what you're trying to accomplish. It's all a matter of discipline. I was determined to discover what life held for me beyond the inner-city streets.

I believe in me more than anything in this world.

The feeling of accomplishment welled up inside of me, three Olympic gold medals. I knew that was something nobody could ever take away from me, ever.

I ran and ran and ran every day, and I acquired this sense of determination, this sense of spirit that I would never, never give up, no matter what else happened.

I know black women in Tennessee who have worked all their lives, from the time they were twelve years old to the day they died. These women don't listen to the women's liberation rhetoric because they know that it's nothing but a bunch of white women who had certain life-styles and who want to change those life-styles.

I tell them that the most important aspect is to be yourself and have confidence in yourself.

I don't consciously try to be a role model, so I don't know if I am or not. That's for other people to decide.

I would be disappointed if I were remembered as a runner because I feelthat my contribution to the youth of America has far exceeded the woman who was the Olympic champion.

Believe me, the reward is not so great without the struggle.

What do you do after you are world-famous and nineteen or twenty and you have sat with prime ministers, kings and queens, the Pope? Do you go back home and take a job? What do you do to keep your sanity? You come back to the real world.

I thought I'd never get to see that. Florence Griffith Joyner -- every time she ran, I ran.

My mother taught me very early to believe I could achieve any accomplishment I wanted to. The first was to walk without braces.

I don't know why I run so fast. I just run.

I knew that whatever I set my mind to do. I could do.

No matter what accomplishments you make, somebody helps you.

I can't' are two words that have never been in my vocabulary. I believe in me more than anything in this world.

My doctors told me I would never walk again. My mother told me I would. I believed my mother.

The potential for greatness lives within each of us.

The triumph can't be had without the struggle.

By the time I was 12 I was challenging every boy in our neighborhood at running, jumping, everything.

Black women . . . work because their husbands can't make enough money at their jobs to keep everything going. . . . They don't go to work to find fulfillment, or adventure, or glamour and romance, like so many white women think they are doing. Black women work out of necessity.

'I can't' are two words that have never been in my vocabulary. I believe in me more than anything in this world.

I'm in my prime. There's no goal too far, no mountain too high.

No matter what great things you accomplish, somebody helps you.

Sometimes it takes years to really grasp what has happened to your life.

The triumph can't be had without the struggle. And I know what struggle is. I have spent a lifetime trying to share what it has meant to be a woman first in the world of sports so that other young women have a chance to reach their dreams.

When I was going through my transition of being famous, I tried to ask God, why was I here? What was my purpose? Surely, it wasn't just to win three gold medals. There has to be more to this life than that.

Winning is great, sure, but if you are really going to do something in life, the secret is learning how to lose.