Dark Horses.

Caio Delarolle

“The race is not always to the swift, nor the battle to the strong…” — Ecclesiastes

Lalouche is a small, slight, quiet man living in Paris. He’s a postman — humble, unassuming, and content delivering mail. But one day, he loses his job to automation. Suddenly, he’s out of work, out of place, and unsure of his future.

In an unexpected twist, Lalouche turns to boxing to make ends meet.

The thing is that he’s not exactly built like a boxer. He’s skinny and certainly not intimidating. But he is quick. And clever. And full of quiet determination.

Despite his stature, Lalouche takes on opponents much bigger, stronger, and more clout than him — and wins. Not with brute force, but with grace, agility, and heart.

Eventually, he earns enough to reclaim his simple life as a postman — but he’s changed. The experience gives him a sense of pride, confidence, and resilience he didn’t have before.

The story above is a summary of “The Mighty Lalouche”, a children’s book written by Matthew Olshan, and a perfect example and a powerful embodiment of an underdog comeback story. The unexpected Hero (didn't look like a winner) Setbacks. Charting one’s path. Developing confidence in one’s abilities and self-belief.

The underdog story has been one that humans have always related to because it reminds us of our failures and hopes of turning things around. It’s a hero's journey.

I remember at work when we were trying to get one of our licenses, one option was to apply for a license from the regulator or acquire a company that had one. The path we finally took to getting that was acquiring a company. The one we picked was in a “not-so-great” state. The appeal then was the “sweet” turnaround, aka ugly duckling to beautiful swan story, it would turn out to be if we did well.

Those stories are always more exciting than the “boring” steady success ones. Or maybe we just had overbloated egos.

But I digress, recently, the underdog concept came up again. This time it was with my son. He was feeling bad about a situation, and being a teenager, he was worried about his peers and how they would react. I started telling him about how a comeback should be his motivation. We bonded over trading scenes from boxing movies where the unexpected person won.

A comeback story is one we can all relate to because it's more than success — it’s about redemption. We connect to it emotionally and psychologically because it typifies the human struggle; we all have failures, pain, shame, and setbacks. Seeing someone rise from these gives us hope. It also shows the fallibility and vulnerability of being human. We are not always rock solid, but we are fixable.

It makes us let go of perfection. A rise-fall-rise arc shows that imperfection doesn’t disqualify greatness. It makes success more within reach if we are only able and willing to keep going.

There’s something electric about watching someone rise when everyone counted them out. It’s not just inspiring — it’s deeply human. It gives us hope that we, too, in our quiet moments of struggle, might find a way back.

Most of us can relate to what it’s like to feel overlooked, underestimated, or counted out. Rooting for the underdog(you) is a quiet rebellion against the idea that only the powerful, the connected, the smartest, the perfect, or the privileged get to succeed.

But it’s just a matter of never saying die, heart, self-belief and stubbornness.

Keep going,

Ije

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