"That is how we were raised."
For the Warrens, growing up with that family name meant possessing a tireless work ethic, tremendous grit and the ability to persevere through any challenge.
All those traits and more make team USA speedskater Sarah Warren, a great niece of Bears President & CEO Kevin Warren, a perfect embodiment of her last name.
Battling through torn ACLs, 10 surgeries and numerous additional bouts of adversity, Sarah persevered through it all to qualify for the U.S. Olympic Team in January. And next week, when she makes her Olympic debut in Milan, her great uncle Kevin, along with his wife, Greta, and their two children, Peri and Powers, will be in Italy to cheer her on.
"To be able to go support her on behalf of my family — I was thinking about my parents and my grandparents, her parents, Morrison Jr. and Cathy — is special," Kevin Warren said. "I was thinking about all the people who have sacrificed and encouraged her to be there, so it is more than just a trip or a race. It is really about the importance for us, as people, to encourage each other and to dream and hope and persevere and support."
The daughter of Morrison Warren, Kevin's nephew, Sarah grew up in Willowbrook and attended Hinsdale South High School, where she was a standout athlete in soccer, track and speedskating. While competing in three junior world championships in speedskating, Sarah also pursued soccer at the collegiate level, playing Division 1 at the University of Illinois.
Kevin remembers that even at a young age, his great niece was incredibly gifted athletically, no matter the sport or competition level.
"She was incredibly athletic," he said. "She was very focused. She was very tough. She was very determined, and she was incredibly bright. You can tell, even as young kids – I am talking about four or five years old – you can tell that there was something really special about her.
"I think when it really struck me with Sarah is that when she started participating in sports, she was able to participate with the boys, and you did not really see any difference. I think it is a reminder, now, why it is so important to provide young girls with the opportunities in sports, like we are doing with girls flag football."
As Sarah grew older, she began to take speedskating more seriously, which meant Morrison Jr. and Cathy driving her from Chicago to Milwaukee — where one of the only indoor speedskating ovals in the United States is located — multiple times a week to practice. Knowing the sacrifices that Sarah's family made to help her reach the pinnacle of any athlete's career moved Kevin to tears.
Back in January, when Kevin watched Sarah qualify for her first Olympics on a laptop at Halas Hall in between meetings, he experienced a flood of those same emotions as she placed second to punch her ticket to Milan.
"The thing that struck me in that moment was all the things in life that have to land properly to provide a platform for someone to have a chance to display greatness like that," Kevin said.
Kevin thought about the sacrifices of his oldest brother, Morrison Jr., who was a trailblazer as a top student-athlete in Arizona, becoming one of the first Black football players to earn a scholarship to Stanford in 1961. He thought about how Morrison Jr. "had the foresight as a Black 17-year-old young man from Phoenix" to take a Greyhound bus by himself to Palo Alto, Calif. to get to college, persevere through injuries on the football field to achieve academic success and, later, join the United States Marine Corps and serve as a Lieutenant during the Vietnam War.
Then he thought of his nephew, Morrison, who followed in his father's footsteps academically and athletically, playing rugby and football at Occidental College before heading to Notre Dame Law School, where he met his wife, Cathy.
"Those were the things, for some reason or another, that I was really thinking about — of all the things that have to fit from a relationship standpoint, to the timing, to kids being born," Warren said. "After that qualifying race, I came back into my office and just sobbed. And my prayer is that more people are put in a position to allow the atmosphere to bring that out.
"And then you add on for what she has had to go through — the multiple knee and ankle surgeries and the hard work and the determination and all those different things coming so closely that everything had to just really line up. And that was just to have a chance to make the team. Now you get a chance to go compete at the Olympics."
With family spread out around the country and various professional lives making it difficult for the Warrens to reunite, the Milan trip will also serve as quality family time. Even in their busy schedules, Kevin and Sarah have made time over the years to support each other, whether that meant Kevin driving down to Champaign-Urbana for Sarah's college soccer games and attending her races in Minnesota or Sarah catching "Uncle Kevin" at Bears games over the past few seasons, most recently their Week 3 win over the Cowboys at Soldier Field.
"He's also like my grandfather," Sarah told the Chicago Tribune. "It's just so much wisdom from him. He's fought tooth and nail to be where he is, and he takes every opportunity. And Uncle Kevin's a huge role model for me."
As Kevin makes the trip to Europe, he will have the entire Warren family on his mind – grandparents, parents, siblings, cousins and everyone in between.
In his eyes, Sarah's success is first and foremost a credit to her own resilience and work ethic, but also her lineage. And her Olympic debut will certainly pay homage to the Warren name.
"That is something that I know from our family standpoint, we just have that ability to grind and to have stamina and to be disciplined and focused," Kevin said.
"And we just never give up."
