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There’s something fishy about old swimmer
By JASON WHITLOCKThe Kansas City Star
A white Jewish mother 12 days older than I is the star of the U.S. Olympic swimming trials, and the American media are treating her like she’s Barry Bonds.
That’s progress.
Seriously, a few years ago, Dara Torres would’ve received the same free pass Roger Clemens enjoyed until he misremembered in front of Congress. Torres and her trainer would’ve been profiled in an upcoming edition of Sports Illustrated and presented as a shining example of all-American, mother-next-door resilience.
Instead, Torres’ thrilling victory in the 100-meter freestyle and qualification for a fifth Olympic team on the Fourth of July have been hit with a series of suspicious questions and stories.
How does a 41-year-old mother of a toddler return from a six-year retirement, recover from back and knee surgery and swim faster than she ever did as a teenager or twenty-something?
Oh, and why is she sucking down asthma medication, which can help build lung capacity?
Yeah, we’ve come a long way from the days when we’d shrug off a bottle of andro sitting in a home-run hitter’s locker and get right back to penning Paul Bunyan fairy tales and publishing fawning books about the “Summer of ‘98.”
Those were the good old days, when we acted like the steroid cheats mostly lived in foreign countries, wrestled for Vince McMahon or were sympathetic, hardworking, white NFL linemen.
Now, we don’t know whom to believe or demonize. Now, middle-aged white women are subject to Barry Bonds treatment.
Freaking Brian McNamee. He created all of this confusion with his tattle-telling on Roger and Roger’s lovely wife, Debbie. We would still be feigning a level of steroid naïvete had the First Family of Baseball not been exposed as alleged liars. It wasn’t that long ago that Roger and Debbie were stars of a hot commercial campaign promoting the idea that he returned to the game only because his cell-phone reception wonked out at the wrong time.
It will be interesting to see how the advertising companies handle Dara Torres. Her story is perfect for pitching products. ESPN.com’s Pat Forde called her “Supermom” in a terrific Saturday column, but “Wonder Woman” might be more appropriate.
It’s only fair to wonder how Torres is doing it.
Consider this: She qualified for her first Olympics (1984) the same year as Carl Lewis (although Lewis was a member of the 1980 U.S. team that boycotted the Moscow Olympics). Lewis, arguably the greatest athlete of all time, qualified for his last Olympics at age 35 in 1996. Torres won Olympic medals on relay teams early in her career. My point is, she’s a real late-bloomer.
Her 24-year rise from Olympic also-ran to Olympic superstar is the equivalent of Michael Jordan teammate Ron Harper not only being a better player than Michael Jordan today but nearly as good as Kobe Bryant.
Hey, maybe she’s a freak of nature, and freaks do come out at night. It’s just hard to swallow. The great ones generally reveal themselves early on. You don’t have to wait until age 40 to see it.
Or maybe having a child late in life threw her body out of whack in a good way. I’m sure there are some thirty-something mothers laughing at that notion.
Whatever the cause — nature, hard work or chemistry — Torres’ Olympic experience will have a cloud cover. I was at a party when she touched the wall first in the 100-meter freestyle finals. Everyone erupted in astonishment and celebration at her victory.
Within minutes, the same people celebrating started cracking steroid jokes.
That’s the sports world we live in now — middle-aged women are not immune. There’s no solution for the cynicism. Torres can pass every drug test. We still won’t believe.
Someone close to her could argue that she has no reason to cheat or even compete. She’s achieved Olympic fame already. But fame is more addictive than cocaine. Americans can’t have enough of it. We’re all constantly auditioning for our own reality show. She has motive.
The whole thing is sad. All of our superheroes are fictional characters now. Even the real ones, the Pat Tillmans, we sully their reputations with lies and exaggerations. It’s safer to believe in Rocky Balboa, Hancock and Santa Claus.
That’s progress. Seriously.