Scott's Articles

Athens-to-Atlanta

In two months, the 21st Annual Athens-to-Atlanta will leave on a cool October morning from the front of the Classic Center in Athens, Georgia.  Several hundred skaters will have gotten up around 5 AM to shower, stretch, eat, hydrate - and focus on the road ahead.

They will skate through a chilly dawn from their warm motels to gather at
the Start Line for one of the greatest days of their lives: to spend a special Sunday in the company of a group of people who have devoted months of their lives preparing to test themselves against the rolling hills of central Georgia, to make lifelong friends - to cramp, recover, and cramp again... to find themselves alone inside with a silly smile at this amazing and very human adventure... and to cross the Finish - victorious - having completed one of the most challenging amateur sporting events in the world.

They'll skate past horses grazing in rural fields, past dozens of
church-goers on their way to Sunday services, and past dozens more headed home - a few hours later.

They'll learn to set new targets and goals, even as they skate.

And, like Robert Persig (Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance) on his motorcycle journey across America many years ago - they'll learn as much about themselves as they do about skating.

Every now and then, something happens - something magic - and your life is never the same.

Athens-to-Atlanta was and is one of those events for me.

Magic.

Inline Club of Boston

Holding hands as they cross the Finish Line

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