In McFarland, a remote town in California, children are born into poor farming families, drop out of school, and even fall into a cycle of poverty, fighting and crime, imprisoning generations of children.
However, when Kevin Costner, the football coach Jim White, broke into the lives of these children, their excellent running potential met Bó Lè and a team of inaugural California Cross Country Championship champions was born.
This story of miracles is from McFarland, a sports film based on a true story from 1987, and it is also the epitome of the spirit of bravery and breaking the shackles of fate.
<h1 class="pgc-h-arrow-right" data-track="5" > we will always be, there is no "American Dream" here</h1>
McFarland is a remote, impoverished agricultural town in California, near Mexico, and its residents are predominantly Hispanic.
The "grumpy" rugby coach White was fired for hitting a player, which forced him to become the only one willing to accept him at McFarland High School as a middle school physical education teacher and assistant coach of the American football team.
As a newcomer, he moved into a neighborhood full of Mexican immigrants, saw humble houses, Mexican restaurants without hamburgers, "gang" team members who would talk to their daughters at night, high school students who had no intention of sports... All of this broke him down and made him firm in the idea of leaving immediately, for him at that time, living here was a nightmare.
MacFarland's children are mostly descendants of laborers and farmers, and although they are born poor, they will always drop out of school for various reasons and have never left the town to live a peaceful life, but they are also restricted by the town.
Their fate seems to have been predestined since birth, and their lives are a predictable vicious circle. White's disagreement with the manager over a rugby match and the loss of an assistant coaching position made White, who already wanted to leave, even more frustrated.
When colleagues persuaded him to use his free time to join food banks, mutual aid groups and other activities to help the children, he did not hesitate to refuse on the grounds that he was not good at it.
However, the next words of colleagues gave Coach White the first time to hear about the fate of McFarland's children: "The children here are neglected, sacrificed, they come from the countryside and return to the countryside, unless they go to prison." ”
Cheap, free stuff is their top priority. Coach White happened to meet his students when he came out of the supermarket, leaning against the outside wall of the supermarket or drinking water from the street pipe or using it to drive away the heat. White, who saw the scene, subconsciously reminded them that there was soda for sale in the supermarket, but they replied to him without thinking: "Water is not free." ”
Repeating the same thing every day will not change anything, and change is always difficult. White gradually discovered that half of the students in the Central Valley had no transportation, and it was extremely common to run between school, farm, and home.
And they consume a lot of carbohydrates every day, plus helping the family do farm work in the hot sun every day, have excellent physical fitness, and are natural runners.
So Coach White brought the change into the lives of McFarland high school students — forming a trail running team.
On October 6, 1987, White and seven players competed in the first official competition. However, because the race was a mountain track, mcFarland, who was accustomed to running on the flat ground, lacked mountain skills and fell behind significantly in the race to become the last place.
The first game failure hit both the freshman team and Coach White, while also giving them the experience and lessons to regroup.
Difficulties should never be an excuse to stand in the way. As Coach White said, "What is difficult? The difficulty is when you lose, you know it's because you didn't try your best. "The courage to do your best is also the key to breaking the cycle of fate and witnessing miracles."
At the same time, it was also in intensive training that Coach White learned about the fate of local children for the second time, which also made him shocked by their inherent cognition and hard life. In order to solve the shortcomings of unfamiliar terrain and insufficient uphill running skills in cross-country competitions, White asked the team to use the undulating almond piles to practice their uphill running skills.
Lap after lap of practice, captain Thomas, who was overwhelmed by the pressure of life and the failure of the race, finally broke out, "We are pickers, we will always be pickers, not runners." Doing the same thing every day, over and over again. You can make us run thousands of times, but nothing will change! ”
In the perception of local children, they are born poor, and their fate is so powerless to change. They don't have the time and the conditions to engage in "upper-class sports" like trail running.
As runners, they don't even have professional running shoes, a pair of shoes is running shoes and both church shoes and school shoes. Before White, no one even told them that they were entitled and capable of changing the status quo, even if it was only to encourage them to have the courage to take the first step.
As the Diaz brothers said after their father quit the team because of their father's objections, cross-country running is as unnecessary as a television set, and an hour of training will help the family do one hour less farm work and make a penny less.
In the small town of McFarland, making money is precisely the more important thing. Parents even think it's unrealistic for their children to go to college because they don't need to read in the fields.
"No one will stay in McFarland unless you have to." McFarland is where the American Dream cannot be realized, but White is the one who brings to them the hope that the "American Dream" can be realized.
<h1 class="pgc-h-arrow-right" data-track="27" > when we run, the world belongs to us</h1>
White's arrival is a sudden change for children who are indulging in such a fate, and a source of courage.
On the road to victory, setbacks are often inevitable. After the first game was lost, the team members trained more and more rigorously, and the film ushered in the first small climax - the McFarland team won the first victory in the second race with a one-point difference, which finally gave them confidence in the cross-country running event. However, during a day of daily training, Coach White suddenly learned of the Diaz brothers' retirement.
In order to persuade the Diaz brothers to return, White followed them and set out to work in the fields before dawn. At the end of the day, he finally understood the helplessness and hardships of this family and proposed the best way to solve the problem of returning to the team: to work in advance and retrain. Training can be postponed, and if necessary, you can help yourself.
As the training got on track, the world of the players gradually began to believe that as long as they ran, they could change their destiny. In the first California Cross Country Championship qualifiers, they finished fourth in the final. The moment they learned the result, instead of revelrying with excitement, they silently wiped away their tears and knelt down on one knee to pray and thank each other.
It wasn't until Coach White took them to the beach that their emotions were cathartic. They run towards the sea as the sun sets, and perhaps toward a future where hope is gradually being seen. At this moment, they are flying with the soul.
The silent emotions along the way were fully released when they were fighting under the setting sun. This group of teenagers who put on the shoulders of their partners and shouted "we did it" loudly were undoubtedly successful.
As José describes in the poem: "When we run, the world belongs to us / When we run, our souls fly and talk to the gods / When we run, we are gods." ”
On December 12, 1987, White led the team to participate in the weekly finals with the blessings of the townspeople. The 7 players endured unimaginable pain from others, and all they did made them superhuman, "With such strength and courage, there is nothing you can't do." ”
Eventually, amid cheers, McFarland became the inaugural champion team of the California Cross Country Championships. Over the next 14 years, McFarland High School won the Texan title nine times, Jim White was always the coach, and Coach White and his family finally found a place to call home.
The English Renaissance essayist and philosopher Francis Bacon once said, "Miracles that transcend nature always arise in the conquest of doom." "These MacFarlane children may not be children of bad luck, but they must be brave enough to conquer destiny.
With the strength of their families, their sincere faith, the enthusiastic encouragement of their neighbors, their commitment and trust to each other, and their work ethic, they have truly changed their "destined" destiny from the most original self-abandonment and decadence on the road of "born this way", to their later hard work to run until they become members of the California team.
As long as you dare to do it, nothing should be like this
The McFarland team under White's direction is not only a championship cross-country team, but also a spirit of winning miracles with bravery and determination. Being born like this should not be an excuse to go with the flow of so-called fate.
People always expect miracles to come, but waiting is never a foolproof solution. Compared to many miracles, the advancing human race itself may be more miraculous than all the miracles.
McFarland's team received the miracle of fate, because after they bravely took the first step, they have been running on the road, never stopping or giving up. They used their tenacity on the track to lead their lives again.
The famous playwright and poet Shakespeare once described the relationship between man and fate in Julius Caesar: "People can control their own destiny, and if we are subject to man, it is not fate that is wrong, but in ourselves." ”
Everyone is working hard to be better, and bravery is the first step to breaking the shackles of fate. Dare to think, dare to do, in order to find more possibilities of success in change.