Character Matters
Sabrina Little closed out the first round of Calvin University’s 2026 January Series on Friday, Jan. 30, by talking about ways in which participating in sports can help, as well as hinder, the formation of character and the creation of virtue. After hosting 10 lectures in the series from Jan. 19 through 30, Calvin will offer additional installments later this year.
In her lecture, titled “Sports as a Laboratory for Virtue,” Little told a story of self-discovery to highlight some of the good things – that is, virtues – that can be formed by participating in athletics. As a championship runner who is also an associate professor of philosophy at Ohio State University, Little described a situation that made her question whether her commitment to long-distance running had gotten in the way of her leading a virtue-filled life.
“In June of 2021, I returned to ultra marathon racing after an extended time away,” said Little, a five-time U.S. National Champion and World Silver Medalist in trail and ultramarathon running.
“I had not raced since 2019 due to a combination of pregnancy with my first child and the COVID-19 pandemic. . . . One of the events was wonderful: becoming a mother. The other event was a catastrophe.”
“We all had to adjust to big changes and new responsibilities during that time,” Little recalled. “We were disrupted from our routines. I had to figure out where running fit into a new rhythm of life.”
This hit home, she added, when she returned to competition in a grueling 50K race that took place in the waning days of the pandemic. “I’m not sure if I expected to be the same person. But when the gun went off, I was not. Physically I was not where I wanted to be. . . . I felt askew almost right away,” said Little.
A fierce competitor who regularly put all of herself into preparing for and then running in races, Little said that in this race she “hit a wall” that led to significant self-understanding. Among other things, she said, she came to realize that by “entering the arena of competition as a mom, I had acquired a new perspective.”
Her new awareness, she added, was grounded in certain virtues that, after pregnancy and spending time away during the pandemic, took on significant meaning. In an important way, she said, she came to see the value of embracing virtues such as love of home and family over the accomplishment of winning a race.
“There are ways to compete that are above reproach. But I realized that my own competitiveness had been partially sustained by selfishness, a preoccupation with my own interests and training,” said Little.
These insights, she added, helped in part to frame her 2024 book The Examined Run, which offers a blend of philosophical reasoning and athletic experience to discuss how sports can shape character.
After that return to competition in 2021, Little explained, she also discerned that envy – not a virtue in any way – had played a role in her racing career. She sensed, she said, that she had been viewing the success of other racers as her own loss.
Being a philosopher as well as a runner, Little said, helped her to link training for, and then participating fully and wisely in, a sport to forming an athlete’s outlook, sense of commitment, and formation of character.
“It may seem odd to incorporate virtue formation either explicitly or implicitly into athletic development,” she noted. “But regardless of whether we’re using sports to form good character or not, we are forming something.” And, depending on your motivations, she asserted, sports can “form character well.”
In public education today, she explained, there is an understanding that schools are no longer in the business of character formation. On the other hand, said Little, “athletics is a space where there is not just tolerance of but also an expectation that participants will be transformed through the activity.”
By an honest pursuit of whatever sport you are involved in, Little added, “character change is an attractive feature. And when used well, it can provide an important and rare opportunity for participants to be refined physically and morally.”
For example, Little said, a way in which sports can form character and develop virtue is by encouraging goal-setting and then working diligently to reach that goal. Essentially, she added, you form a solid character, inside or outside of sports, when you persistently use your God-given talents to achieve a worthy end.
Alongside setting performance goals, she continued, “We can select character objectives such as leaning into gratitude for our excellent teammates’ performances rather than begrudging their successes.” In other words, she said, we can find ourselves able to celebrate the achievements of others, even if they leave us in their wake in a race. Sports can widen our perspective.
Along these lines, she commented, “I can aim high in my sport with humility and gratitude and acknowledge dependence on people in my life who make my striving possible.”
During the lecture Little also told a story about a time when she coached a girls’ cross-country team in Texas and her team was in the running to win a statewide championship.
“During that race, a girl from another team fell as she was approaching the finishing line. One of my athletes saw her fall,” said Little. “Rather than run fast past her, she stopped to assist the other runner to her feet.”
This act of kindness was unusual and marked her team in a bad way.
As the two girls started together slowly down the final straightaway toward the finish line, many other runners sped by. Then, when the official results came in, Little’s team didn’t even appear on the record; they were disqualified because one of their runners had assisted a runner from the other team. The rules stated that a runner was not allowed to touch other runners during a race.
Following those results, Little said, she faced a dilemma – to praise or disclaim what had happened. Her team had worked hard, winning many races that season. They had had high hopes that they would come out on top in that important race. Then, because of a runner who had acted as a good Samaritan to help her fallen competitor, all of the team’s work had seemingly been for naught.
“This was a situation in which our performance goals and our character goals were opposed,” said Little. As a coach, she had pushed and challenged her team to run hard and fast in order to win. But she had also taught the runners the virtue of having a good character.
“That was something I had told my team I cared about a good deal of the time,” said Little. “So I had to check my heart and assess my response to our team’s performance.” Little explained that she had also often run with the team during practices, edging them on, encouraging them to persist and grow beyond the expectations they had for themselves. But after that state championship race, she said, she ultimately knew what she had to say to the team.
Essentially, she said, she let them know that character mattered to her. “And I wanted to show my primary allegiance to that,” she explained.
However tough it was to lose the championship – and, in fact, not even to place in the standings – Little said, it was important to remind her team of what matters most:
“You have to actually care about virtue if you want to encourage meaningful character. You have to care more about virtue than you do about success.”
