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Perec withdraws French team says track champion is out of Games
SYDNEY, Australia (AP) -- Marie-Jose Perec, a three-time Olympic champion sprinter so reclusive she's been dubbed the "Greta Garbo of athletics," was ruled out of the Sydney Games after fleeing Australia on Thursday -- the eve before she was to compete. But even Singapore turned out to be not far enough away to fulfill her desire for privacy. A clash with a TV cameraman at Singapore airport led to hours of police questioning for Perec and her companion, former American 400-meter runner Anthuan Maybank. Back in Sydney, after holding out hope that Perec somehow would return to the Olympics, the French team announced late Thursday that she had officially withdrawn. "The French delegation regrets that an athlete who has brought so much to Olympism in general, and to French sports in particular, is not participating in the Sydney Games," said a statement released by the French Olympic delegation. The statement also said Perec's departure had nothing to do with drug tests and that she had not been subjected to an out-of-competition drug test before the Games.
Denise Kaigler, spokeswoman for Perec's chief sponsor, Reebok, said Perec left the country after being accosted in her Sydney hotel by an unidentified man. "Marie-Jose has been under a great deal of pressure and yesterday afternoon she was harassed in her hotel room by an unidentified man who forced his way into her room and threatened her," Kaigler said. Police and a hotel official said they had no knowledge of such an incident. The bizarre tale became stranger as Perec, who in 1996 became the second woman to sweep the 200 and 400 gold medals in an Olympics, flew away from Australia. Perec, two-time defending champion in the 400 meters and a potential threat to favorite Cathy Freeman in the 400 at the Sydney Games, headed to Melbourne and then on to Singapore, where freelance TV cameraman Kyme Hallion, working for Sydney's Channel Nine, was waiting. Hallion, who was later checked for head injuries at a Singapore hospital, said Maybank assaulted him in an effort to get the tape he shot of the couple. "He came at me like a raging bull," he told The Associated Press in an interview from his office.
Perec, 32, had been a mystery woman in Sydney, where she refused to train with the French team and hid from reporters. Her only public appearance was her arrival at the Sydney Airport, where she sprinted past cameramen. Perec, who had hoped to win an unprecedented third straight 400-meter gold in the Olympics, was so reclusive the Australian media labeled her the "Greta Garbo of athletics." Vial said Perec had been staying at the Grand Mercure Apartments in downtown Sydney. A New South Wales police spokeswoman said no report had been received about harassment at that location, and the general manager of the complex said staff members were unaware of any such incident. "It is an extremely high-security complex, and only guests with the appropriate technology are able to gain access beyond the reception area," general manager Robert Murray said. Vial said nobody in the French delegation had spoken to Perec in three or four days. "It's a shame that she was not able to become part of the delegation at our training camp or at the Olympic village," he said. "Maybe she made a bad decision by not staying in the village, where she would have been more secure." Freeman has not lost at 400 meters in more than three years but has lost seven of her nine career races against Perec. She was not talking to reporters Thursday. But Australian track and field coach Chris Wardlaw said Perec probably wasn't ready to run. "I think if she's not here she obviously wasn't in shape, so it wouldn't have been a great race anyway," Wardlaw said. "She's the athlete of the decade in the '90s, a truly great athlete, and obviously in her mind she wasn't going to be able to compete up to that level." Perec, nicknamed "The Gazelle" because of her fluid, long-legged running style, won the 1996 Atlanta Games gold in 48.25 seconds -- an Olympic record. But she has not won a 400-meter race since then. Perec has been tormented by Epstein Barr syndrome, a rare virus that causes chronic fatigue, and dropped out of three races this summer in Europe that would have pitted her against Freeman. Perec's only public comments have come on her web site. On Tuesday, she wrote that her training was going well, but that she was scared. "The games have hardly begun and already I wish they would end
because I'm so scared," she wrote. "I simply have to make sure my
training place stays secret. That's the main thing, is to stay
relaxed."
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