Charlie Wittmack: Conquer the World or Die
Outside the Lines (Sunday, 9 a.m. ET, ESPN2)
ESPN.com(an interactive presentation integrating stunning imagery, text and video)
The Sporting Life with Jeremy Schaap (10 p.m. Friday, ESPN Radio)
ESPN The Magazine (on newsstands Friday)
SportsNation (3 p.m. today, chat on ESPN.com)
On the surface, Charlie Wittmack looks like anything but a world class athlete. But deep within his 5-foot-7, 145-pound frame is a burning need to push his body beyond its limit. He says it’s an addiction: “I’ve never done cocaine. I’ve never given birth, but these experiences are like that.” It’s the reason last summer Wittmack risked everything he had – his life, his marriage, his money and his role as a father – to complete a self-made event he dubbed “The World Triathlon.” Starting at the origin of the River Thames in England, the plan was to swim, cycle, run and climb his way 10,000 miles across 13 countries until he stood on the summit of Mount Everest. But then the adventure began, and everything changed. ESPN.com senior writer Wayne Drehs tells the emotional tale of a man who was ready to give up everything to try to find himself, only to discover that the answers he was looking for he had left behind.
“I will lay down and die before I think about quitting.” – Charlie Wittmack, prior to his “World Triathlon”
E:60 (Tuesday, 7 p .m. ESPN)
ESPN’s award-winning newsmagazine E:60 returns with five consecutive weeks of new programs, continuing its standard of investigative journalism, exclusive interviews and long-form television storytelling.
The Grandy Man: Curtis Granderson
Yankees All-Star Curtis Granderson has a bond with the family of Brian Bluhm, a lifelong Detroit Tigers fan who was gunned down in the 2007 Virginia Tech shootings. Rachel Nichols reports.
https://youtu.be/KorkgB8TKXM
Vietnam Vet Takes Golf Dream to St. Andrew’s
After Mike Reeder lost both legs in Vietnam, he returned to the U.S. looking for purpose and direction – and found them during a chance encounter in a golf pro shop. Years later, he’s chasing a different dream: to be the first wheelchair golfer to play the Old Course at St. Andrew’s. E:60 follows Reeder to Scotland.
https://youtu.be/TcoGY7VpX4s
Nothing but Eyes
The All-American Soap Box Derby in Akron, Ohio, is the culmination of the year for 550 competitors from around the world. But for one family in 2010, victory meant so much more. Chris Connelly reports.
https://youtu.be/XciUMlsGO7A
ESPN Deportes Presents E:60, Network’s First Sports Newsmagazine
ESPN Deportes E:60 ( Tuesday, 6 p.m., ESPN Deportes)
Following the format of ESPN’s Emmy Award-winning prime time newsmagazine E:60, ESPN Deportes launches its own version featuring a renowned team of reporters including José Ramón Fernández, David Faitelson and Jorge Ramos pursuing culturally relevant stories that take an inside look at the world of sports. ESPN Deportes E:60 is the first prime-time sports newsmagazine on Spanish-language television in the U.S. Each episode will include one main story produced exclusively for ESPN Deportes, as well as previous segments from ESPN’s E:60. The show debuts with a report on the Latin impact on MLB and the journeys of Latin ball players in that league.
https://youtu.be/WpK-8znuoEc
ESPN Sports Science Studies “Splendid Splinter”
SportsCenter and various MLB-Related Programming
Seventy years ago, Ted Williams not only led the American League in home runs, walks and runs scored, he became the last player to hit .400 when he batted .406 for the Boston Red Sox in 1941. ESPN Sport Science host John Brenkus illustrates how Williams’ slight uppercut swing “made the impact zone – the possible intersection of pitch trajectory and swing path – roughly four times larger than one created by a relatively flat swing.” Williams himself calculated that swinging at pitches just two inches off the strike zone increased the zone from 4.8 to 6.5 square feet, giving pitchers a 35-percent larger zone. That prompted the ESPN Sport Science team to say, “Ted Williams was in to Sport Science decades before us!”
https://youtu.be/s19NVV3hNj0
-30-
-30-
