Oh Jeez Oh Pete! I lived overseas for many years. When people tell me about their experiences on their 2 week vacation in the country where I spent my twenties and part of my thirties, I listen politely and move on. I don't tell them about my time there except to say that I lived there. And they are never really interested in hearing what I have to say about it anyway. They just want to tell me about their experience. That's just the way people are.

How much could you truly love the sport, not to watch it on the Olympics in that many years?

I have more respect now for those "amateurs" who get really excited about their middling success but care about the sport, than your hours of toiling in a gym and contempt for anything beyond yourself. Truly disappointing.

I hope we're at your 14.5 minutes and counting.

She just isn't doing a very good job.

Even as Sey acknowledges her attitude is obnoxiously elitist---definitely something not to be shared with society at large---she indulges in a needlessly mean-spirited, gloating post. How much would it hurt her to just let people enjoy sports their own way?

"You weren't there, you don't know, you can't understand." Actually, I'm sure we can. Most people have some modicum of intelligence and capacity for comprehension. You don't have to hit a 130 mph serve in tennis or complete the routines of a world-class gymnast to appreciate of the achievement of those who can and do. Additionally, you need not be at the pinnacle of a given field to claim membership within its ranks.

I hope Sey does a better job in keeping lid on her inner athlete in the future before her inner "horrible, condescending jerk" ruins it for someone else.

You sound like a horrendous bitch, all right. Glad we cleared that up.

Not really my problem though, since I've never understood the affinity for sports that so many people seem to have. To me, physical activity is something to do, not watch. I could never see what enjoyment might be had in sitting on one's ass while somebody else has the fun. Pointless.

One of he true marks of the elite is a graciousness that they share with those of lesser talent or expertise. I'm a photographer and one of the things that often tells one the level of an individual photographer is how they relate to hobbyists. Everyone can take a picture but to say that everyone can take a professional or artistic picture is foolhardy. The less secure, less talented photographers are dismissive and arrogant. The really talented tend to be secure and supportive of those who aspire. The same would apply to athletics. I'm sorry Ms. Sey has inner demons and frustrations but as one poster said she appears stuck at a mental level of age 14. My opinion is that those who speak of their previous athletic involvement are only making conversation and wish to connect conversationally, they are not in any way comparing themselves with elite athletes. Most people are not stupid enough to think they are, or ever could have been Michael Jordon or some other such superstar. My suggestion would be for Ms. Sey to apply any proceeds from her book sales, if there are any, to counseling.

But is it really fair for Jennifer Sey to look down on others when she never reached the pinnacle of her so-called "sport"? After all, by her bitter logic, Olympic athletes have every right to look down on her with the same kind of scorn that she reserves for high school gymnasts.

If she were truly honest with herself she would admit that she was a sub-elite, also-ran who never made it to the big show. What right does she have to dump on the enthusiasm of others?

Exactly!

And for someone to say, in essence, "Pffft. You were never as good as I was, so who cares whether you even loved the sport. Be gone with you, you commonor" is disheartening and mean.

It is like squashing the spirit of a young kid who comes to you excited about a crayon drawing, and excoriating him because it is not a Renoir.

Good job, Jen Sey. Go watch the Olympics with people you deem worthy of your company. Clearly, that is not us. Or most of your friends.

Though she never follows her argument in the last few paragraphs to its logical conclusion, Sey basically seems to be suggesting that athletes that train for years years are basically throwing their lives away for a "few possible yet unlikely moments of glory" that ultimately mean nothing and accomplishes nothing of lasting value. In light of the conclusion that she seems to be pointing towards here, it seems more like her problem is not with the fans so much as it is with the fact that she wasted her childhood and is bitter about it. Oh, and since she was never in the Olympics, according to her own logic, she has a lot of nerve comparing herself to truly "elite" athletes as she obviously had neither the dedication nor the skill to make it to the Olympics herself.

Jennifer, I was a gymnast in my teens. Sorry if you don't like hearing that. I was a lousy gymnast, not being built for the sport, too tall and arms too long, totally not suited for tumbling. I only started taking lessons at 12 when I saw another girl doing cool things on the monkey bars during recess. Yet, even with the little training I received with my once a week classes and then daily during the high school sport season, I managed to do almost all of Olga Korbut's routine just ten years after she competed it at the Olympic level (not to mention I thought I had put one sequence together myself, never realizing it was part of her routine until years later). Imagine that, its how fast the sport progressed in one decade after one gymnast, and then Nadia, captured the nation's interest, and us awful fans took to the gym enmasse.

You see, by having the sport explode in popularity, all of a sudden a better group of top athletes were able to emerge, better equipment manufactured, and better coaching and gym options. All because a bunch of little girls watched somebody else compete. I'm amazed that you'd hate us fans so. When I was in high school, I remember hearing that women didn't have the right muscular structure to do giant swings. Well, looky now!

Even though I didn't train as much as you did, or compete at your level, I still had to endure the ripped hands and severely bruised arms as I tried to get my body to do what I wanted it to on the bars, especially when I was so clearly not of the right body type. I still had to overcome nerves when it was my time to compete and all eyes at the gym would be on me alone.

But you know what? Even though I was a crappy gymnast, those movements still swirl through my head almost daily, at weird times. The perseverance I learned, the mind/body control, still matters to me even if I never competed at a higher level.

Now I ski. And I took to that very easily through the lessons I had learned from gymnastics about focusing on form rather than throwing myself off the steepest hill before I was ready. I had to overcome the fear of standing on top of a slope that was steeper than the one before, mastering quicker turns and sometimes jumps, so I consider myself a skier even though I've never competed. After a few years and the difficulty of learning in my 30s with an older body, I can now do black diamonds out west. This is the sport I probably could have been competitive at had I started in my youth (with the money and training to go along with it) since I love it and am built for it more than gymnastics.

How incredibly arrogant of you to suggest I didn't DO gymnastics or really ski now! Like others have said, you seem more bitter about maybe being forced into your sport and then never achieving glory. Because, even though I was a gymnast in the 80s, I had to look up who you were a few days ago after reading a previous article. Is that the problem, that you work in a corporate office and only now, after publicity of your book, people realize you once were an elite gymnast? That you aren't a household name like Marylou after all those years of sacrifice? It really does sound like you need some therapy to get over this hatred of fans, especially when you say this is the first time you'll be watching the Olympics since you left. What love of sport can there be if you weren't interested to see how things have progressed since you left? Sounds more like reliving a trauma than a satisfying memory. You obviously still haven't dealt with whatever issues you have.

And here I thought you were going to write about how you hate it when arm chair fans make stupid assumptions about your sport without ever having tried gymnastics. Imagine my shock to see that you loathe MY even feeling a connection to it at all since I once was ONLY a high school athlete.