Ian Chamenko - 2017 Senior Athletic Awards Dinner Speech

Senior Ian Chamenko (Beacon Falls, Conn.), a four-year member of the Saints Cross Country, Indoor/Outdoor Track & Field squads, addressed his fellow student-athletes as the "senior speaker" at Emmanuel's Senior Athletic Awards Dinner on May 8, 2017. Ian's remarks are as follows:

Before I begin I would just like to give some acknowledgments. First thank you to Alexis, Jamahl, Dan, the trainers, all the people who do the behinds the scenes work to keep the organism that is Emmanuel Athletics functioning.

To our coaches. There are adults in our lives and then there are our coaches. The coach/athlete relationship is a really special one and I will for sure miss my coaching staff. Special congratulations to Coach Alice Kramer on a long and successful career at Emmanuel.

An acknowledgment to our families, our friends, the people who send you confetti emojis when you tell them you stole a base in your softball game or shaved a single second of your mile time. Keep people that celebrate the small victories close.

Lastly. Let’s recognize ourselves. We are seniors, we finished our thesis, turned in our research papers, and it’s time to relax.

After I accepted Alexis’ invitation to speak at the athletic banquet last month we were sitting in her office and she asked if I had any questions. I immediately asked for a prompt on what I should talk about. She told me that it was totally up to me and I could go in any direction I wanted…. After three different drafts that I hated, I gave myself a prompt.

The prompt: What did you learn as an athlete at Emmanuel College? Why does it matter that you just four years of a sport? Feel free to share any personal experiences you think are relevant.

My personal experience: Last week, I was wrapping up a phone interview for a job. I was in a good mood and it was going really well. At the conclusion of the interview, the woman who was interviewing me asked if there is anything else that didn’t come up in our conversation that I would like her to know. I paused and then told her that she should know that I was an athlete in college.

She asked me why I thought that was important. In my defense, I was sleep deprived, and I have been sleep deprived legitimately every day of this entire month, hashtag seniors, but I told this potential employer that she should know I was an athlete because it was something that I was heavily involved in during college and it taught me about time management.

And maybe to some of you that sounds like a fine and appropriate answer, but I hung up the phone and I cringed. My response was cliché and I felt like I had just read the Yahoo Answers version of “What did you learn from playing sports in college?”

I am someone who is thoughtful and critical. To the extent that I alienate people who care about me by making everything into a liberal arts analysis. Sorry mom, sorry Starr and Chris. So selfishly, tonight, I am taking this speech as an opportunity for redemption.

So… My deeper, more thoughtful answer to why it matters that I was an athlete in college is because I became more familiar with THE PROCESS. As an Emmanuel Saint and under the close direction of Coach Tony DaRocha, I learned to: recognize the process, trust the process, and enjoy the process.

To recognize the process, you have to acknowledge that it's going to take work. Success is the result of continuous effort. All of our favorite athletes: Rob Gronkowski, David Ortiz, Barack Obama (he plays basketball) will speak to the fact that they didn’t suddenly arrive at greatness. Rather there was a process involved.

Trusting the process is maybe the most difficult part. During Cross Country, we are sent an email on the first day with every single workout of the season. Coach Tony loads us up on miles in late August / September, destroys us with speed in October, and gradually cuts the workouts down in November. The idea is to have us hit our peak fitness during championship season. You almost want to hate Coach Tony come mile repeats during mid-season, but recognizing that each workout is making you stronger and pushing you towards faster times is what I mean about trusting the process.

Lastly, enjoying the process. I am proud to say that “catching up with a friend” over an eight mile run is something that actually happens in my life. During times of failure and setback, it’s really easy to forget why we love our sports. Some of us may even forget that right now. It’s important to remember that we deliberately chose to compete at the collegiate level. We watched numbers dwindle from out teams, we competed without scholarship, and with the exemption of Julian Diggs we didn’t become campus celebrities like they do at DI schools. Regardless, we enjoyed ourselves and had the opportunity to continue the sports we love.

I argue that the process will resurface in other aspects of our lives… whether it be professionally, academically, or personally. As we transition into whatever comes after graduation, we should take comfort in our learned abilities to: recognize these processes, to trust these processes, and to enjoy these processes. Success is the result of continuous effort.

I wish all the graduating seniors the best of luck in future endeavors. Keep your team mates close after graduation. Let’s have an awesome senior week.

Thank you.

WATCH IAN'S SPEECH BELOW