Odd things can happen when we are reminded that mind and body are one and the same. Consider these vignettes from the world of sport:

1. Ann Trason ran the 100-mile Western States run with a knee ligament completely torn off the bone. Trason's re- sdiency reminds us that pain must be "conscious" to be perceived. She won the race, and had surgery afterward to repair the ligament.

2. Antonio Abertondo performed a feat of distance swimming never before achieved. In 1961, he swam the 22-mile English Channel - round trip. This was not without some difficulties. During the return trip, he had hallucinations of sharks in his path. Extreme stress can trigger psychotic symptoms, even when we do not think of it as "mental" stress.

3. How much do we rely on vision? Bill Knox put this to the test in 1933 when be bowled a perfect game a score of 300 without seeing the pins. Knox was trying to prove his theory of "spot" bowling, that is, laying down the pins at a particular spot.

4. Bare-knuckle boxing was a brutal sport outlawed in the early 20th century. Vicious as it was, it probably produced less brain damage then today's boxing with padded gloves. Why? The bare fist received instant feed back from what it hit, and the face is a lot softer than the head. The padded glove pounds away at the head. oblivious to the cu- iiiiiltiti@,e dat@i@@,ge it causes the unsuspecting brain.

5. In 1987, Lynne Cox swam across the 44-degree waters of the Bering Strait, from the USA to Russia. Her training in cold waters resulted in an adaptation in which her brain instructed her body to grow extra fat to protect her. She swam without a wet suit or lanolin grease. She was five foot six, 180 lbs., with 35 percent body fat. The case of Lynne Cox demonstrates the brain and body's remarkable adaptability.

6. Are there limits to human performance, or are they just "mental" limits? For many years, the 4 minute mile seemed unattainable. Then came Glenn Cunningham. At age eight, he lost all the toes and much of the muscle tissue in his left foot as the result of a fire. Despite this handicap (or because of it), he developed the principle of negative splits (finishing a race faster than you start) and became a world record winner in 1938. His training principles were later used by Roger Bannister to break the 4 minute mile.

7. How long is long-distance running? Ask the 6 or so annual participants in the Sri Chinmoy 3,100 mile race held in New York City every year. The runners traverse a half mile loop 6,200 times over roughly 50 days, sleeping for six hours/day. They practice a form of meditation that allows them to dissociate mentally while they run.

8. Speaking of dissociation, consider Jack Youngblood, L.A. Ram defensive end in the 1970's, who played in two N.F.L. playoff games with a broken leg, telling a reporter, "Why shouldn't I play? There was no blood and the bone wasn't sticking out" Adrenaline and pain medicine do not sufficiently explain Youngblood's performance. Dissociation has been physiologically demonstrated in Dr. Frank Putnam's PET scan studies of individuals with Dissociative Icientitj@ Disorder.

9. English parachute jumper Tony Boucher made a near fatal error when he mistakenly opened his second chute with the first chute already open. He had only limited memory for the incident. Over-production of adrenaline interferes with memory and problem-solving ability. A "etes niust be "up" for a game, yet learn to control excessive adrenaline, which can result in erron. It is a fine line which the best athletes learn to manage.

10. How long can the body be trained to relax and not breathe? Consider Joseph Kittinger, who in 1966 jumped out of an airplane at 102,000 feet and went into a 4 minute, 38 second free fall at minus 94 degree temperatures, at up to 600 miles per hour. Breathing at such speed would mean certain death, so Kittinger developed powerful breathing skills.