Author: Samuel Clayborne

On a cold winter morning inside the Palmer Ridge High School gym in Monument, the sound of basketballs echo against the walls. Bears coach Jason Boyer watches his team warm up, calm but focused. Off to the side, senior guard Addison “Addie” Steenland goes through her routine: same shots, same footwork, same discipline. “Effort and attitude are always a choice,” she once said. And it shows. Steenland, a 5’8” shooting guard and standout student with a 4.0 GPA, grew up chasing her older brother’s work ethic. “I watched him train every day,” she says. “Seeing how hard he worked made…

Inside the U.S Olympic & Paralympic Museum in Colorado Springs, five gold medals shimmer under the lights. They belong to Dr. Eric Heiden, one of the greatest speed skaters in Olympic history. But when asked what makes him proudest today, he doesn’t look at the medals. He smiles and says softly, “Oh, it’s what I do now… as a doctor.” That’s Eric Heiden — humble, focused and grounded. He once stood on the world’s biggest stage, winning five gold medals at the 1980 Winter Olympics in Lake Placid. No one has ever matched it. Yet decades later, his joy comes…