The title -- "Pursuing Victory With Honor" -- makes clear our
philosophy that sports best achieves its positive impact on participants and
society when everyone plays to win. In fact, without the passionate pursuit
of victory much of the enjoyment, as well as the educational and spiritual
value, of sports will be lost. Winning is important and trying to win is
essential.
Winning is Important, but Honor is More Important. Quality sports
programs should not trivialize or demonize either the desire to win or the
importance of actually winning. It is disrespectful to athletes and coaches
who devote huge portions of their lives to being the best they can in the
pursuit of individual victories, records, championships and medals, to
dismiss the importance of victory by saying, "It's only a game." The
greatest value of sports is its ability to enhance the character and uplift
the ethics of participants and spectators.
Ethics are Essential to True
Winning. The best strategy to improve sports is not to de-emphasize
winning but to more vigorously emphasize that adherence to ethical standards
and sportsmanship in the honorable pursuit of victory is essential to
winning in its true sense. It is one thing to be declared the winner, it is
quite another to really win.
There is No True Victory Without
Honor. Cheating and bad sportsmanship are simply not options because
they rob victories of meaning and value and replace the inspirational high
ideals of true sport with the degrading and petty values of a dog-eat-dog
marketplace. Victories attained in dishonorable ways are hollow and degrade
the concept of sport.
Ethics and Sportsmanship Are Ground Rules.
Programs that adopt Pursuing Victory With Honor are expected to take
whatever steps are necessary to assure that coaches and athletes are
committed to principles of ethics and sportsmanship as ground rules
governing the pursuit of victory. Their responsibilities to demonstrate and
develop good character must never be subordinated to the desire to win. It
is never proper to act unethically to win.
Benefits of Sports Come From
the Competition, Not the Outcome. Quality amateur sports programs are
based on the belief that the vital lessons and great value of sports are
learned from the honorable pursuit of victory, from the competition itself
rather than the outcome. They do not permit coaches or others to send the
message that the most important benefits derived from athletic competition
can only be achieved when an athlete or a team wins.
