It's Hard to Find Government Grants

I’ve always wanted to live and train like a professional athlete. No job and time constraints — just bike, run, go to the gym, recover, and do it all over again year-round.

Most professional athletes don’t work in the traditional sense. Their “work” consists of long workouts, travel, racing, keeping sponsors happy, and related tasks.

They work very hard doing what many of us would consider to be a dream way of life.

The professional athlete dream isn’t possible for most of us.

 We have families, mortgages and a multitude of other responsibilities that require us to hold down a real job for 40 or more hours per week trying to keep food on the table and shoes on the kids.

Most of us also don’t have the one-in-a-million genetic ability needed to reach the top level of our selected sport (note: I’m still mad at my parents about that genetics issue).

After carefully analyzing the situation, I came to the conclusion that for me to achieve the “professional athlete” dream (ignoring age and genetic ability) one of three scenarios would have to happen.

Scenario one: Win the lottery (not likely), marry a wealthy widow (my wife probably wouldn’t allow that), or inherit a ton of money from a wealthy relative (I don’t think I have any).

Scenario two: Cash in my IRAs for startup funding, start drinking the cocktails that most professional endurance athletes took before “sports being cleaned up,” and hope that I can find a way to land a pro contract with a deep-pockets sponsor.

Given my level of chronological maturity, lack of athletic talent, meager IRAs, and my fear of drugs, scenario two is a really bad option.

Scenario three: Get some free stuff from the federal government (“professional athlete assistance”).

This last option may have some merit, especially if I can convince Michelle Obama, Kathleen Sebelius and Jay Carney that government funding for my professional athlete dream would be a great way to promote health, fitness and big government success in the United States.

Think about it — instead of having angry taxpayers focus on a dysfunctional website that sells an unwanted product, the happy-face message during news conferences would be “Federal Government Helps baby boomer Become Successful Pro Athlete.”

After deciding that scenario three was the way to go, I compiled a rough list of what I would need the government to fund to help me “go pro.”

The list includes several professional-level bikes, carbon fiber wheel sets, and related equipment ($30,000), a travel-to-races RV (($50,000), airline travel, lodging, and meals for faraway events ($25,000/year).

I would also need custom race uniforms for every possible weather condition ($5,000), an Olympic-caliber coach, massage therapist, and nutritionist ($30,000/year), and miscellaneous items such as a high-end smartphone with apps to track my workouts and communicate with my fans and sponsors.

With my list of pro athlete needs in hand, I started researching what was available free from the federal government that might help fund those pro athlete necessities.

My first stop on the funding search was www.grants.gov. I found one grant that seemed to fit my situation — Funding Opportunity Number PA-12-225 “Fatigability, Activity Limitations, and Bioenergetics in Aging.”

This grant appeared to be a good match, but unfortunately individual U.S. citizens were not on the eligible applicants list (however, foreign institutions were encouraged to apply).

After determining that there were no federal grants available to fund my pro athlete dream, I moved to benefits.gov, welcometousa.gov, and healthcare.gov.

I didn’t find much in the way of pro athlete funding assistance at any of those websites. The best that I could do was maybe score some food stamps and possibly a free phone if I quit my job, depleted all of my savings, and qualified for a low-income program.

The only two bright spots in my government-funding-for-a-pro-athlete search were the weight loss initiative under “Wellness” and wheelchairs in the “Durable medical Equipment” section in the Health Care Act.

Losing some weight would certainly help me in a quest to become a pro athlete, but — racing in a wheelchair instead of on a pro-level bicycle might be an uphill battle.

Remember — it’s hard to find good government benefits for a want-to-be-a-professional-athlete baby boomer.


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