Motivation Quote by Maurice Greene

Greene’s line lands like locker-room realism, but it’s also a tidy philosophy of performance under pressure. By invoking “the Lord above,” he’s not launching a theological argument so much as drawing a hard boundary between what an athlete can and can’t own. Weather becomes the perfect metaphor for the chaos surrounding competition: lane assignments, wind, rain, track temperature, travel fatigue, even a rival’s breakout day. You don’t get to negotiate any of it. You only get your response.

The intent is practical and protective. Sprinters live in a world where tiny margins decide careers, and conditions can make times look “slow” or “fast” in ways that mislead fans and even selectors. Greene sidesteps that trap by reframing the weather as non-negotiable noise. It’s a statement designed to keep blame from metastasizing into excuse-making, while also preventing self-worth from being tethered to variables outside the body.

The subtext is competitive maturity: control what’s controllable, refuse the alibi, keep the mind quiet. There’s also a subtle leveling move in “Whatever we get, we have to work with.” It implies fairness through shared constraint; everyone on the track is subjected to the same sky. In elite sport, where technology, funding, and access can tilt the field, weather is one of the few indiscriminate forces left. Greene turns that into a stoic rallying point: conditions aren’t a verdict, they’re a task.