Quotes About Determination

My long-range mission is to be the first athlete to win the Nobel Prize.

My goal is to be UFC champion, and my eyes are on that prize.

You've got to keep your eye on the prize, always want more and never settle for what you have.

Look at all the champs over time once they get the belt - they just fall off. I'm not one of those guys. The belt isn't my ultimate prize, it just looks good with all my other gold, chains, and diamonds.

You want to win all games, which means you want to win all cups and all prizes.

It was always about being first, about winning. There were no prizes for second place. My mother and father said, 'Do whatever you want, as long as you're the best at it.'

It doesn't really matter who I turn pro with. What matters is where I take my tennis.

I knew I was going to play pro tennis when I was 12.

Regardless of whether I'm starting or not, I'll try and be the best pro I can be.

I was told once if I kept breaking things on my legs, that I wasn't going to be able to walk soon, you know? I wanted to be a pro skateboarder, but it was too hard. I was trying, but it wasn't going to happen.

Once I turned pro, I was like,' OK, this is not fun and games now. This is me. I'm going to come, and I work on karma. I'm not going to go after somebody if I don't have a reason behind it, so as soon as there is some sort of a reason for me to do something that I need to do, then I'll do it.'

After I won my first amateur fight, I figured I would do fighting on the side while I was going to school. I got an offer after that amateur fight to take a professional fight. The opponent kind of wanted to have an easy win for her pro debt, and they said they'd pay me $1,500. I was like, 'Yeah, might as well get paid for what I was doing.'

I've been working to be a pro since I was 11 years old.

I know I will have to prove I am the best and make history in pro boxing, but I have no doubts about it, as I did in the amateurs, and I will do it as a pro.

Even through all those Pro Bowls, at the end of the day, I was always just a seventh-round pick.

I'll be honest, when I first started pro wrestling, everybody else did clotheslines better than me. They did everything about pro wrestling better than me. But when it comes to fighting, getting nitty and gritty, I'm the man.

I didn't know I was good enough to be a pro growing up.

I think when I moved to the United States and saw how serious basketball was and how good I was compared to everyone else. You just came from Canada and you're top five in the country; you're young and everyone says you can be a pro. That's when I started thinking: if I work hard, the dream can come true.

To be quite honest, and anybody will tell you, growing up I was going to be a pro athlete. I didn't have any option. That was my way out.

Most pro athletes are super competitive, super clutch, and they don't want to lose at anything.

Ever since I was at Blackburn, when you talk about getting pro contracts I was never the guy that was talked about as, 'This guy is going to be the best player, the next best thing.'

When you're a young pro from an undeveloped country in road cycling then you're on the back foot.

The pro game is about confidence.

I want to score goals. Everyone says that's the only part of my game that's missing. Before I was a pro I used to score goals for fun. I want to bring that back into my game.