For Nadia Comaneci, it was the most dangerous night of her life.
She could have been shot. But she didn’t care. Enough was enough.
The night she fled across the Romanian border in 1989, the legendary gymnast thought she would never see her family again.
In her wildest dreams, she never imagined the Ceausescu regime would be toppled just a month later.
Those perfect tens in Montreal at the age of 14 had made her an international star. But she was a bird trapped in a gilded cage. Escape was the only option.
‘There was this time, this opportunity. I had that chance and I did it. Then the revolution happened,’ she said.
‘I was very concerned about my family. When I left, I knew I was never going to see them again because I didn’t know the system was going to change.’
Scrambling to freedom in pitch darkness for six hours across icy countryside, she and a group of six others tumbled into the arms of Hungarian police. She had found a new life.
Now 38 and happily married to American dual gold medallist Bart Conner, she reflects with equanimity on the deadliest night of her life.
‘When I think about it now, yeah I could have been shot. But I made it,’ she says with quiet satisfaction.
‘I didn’t realise how dangerous it was. When you have something in your mind and you want to do it — that’s the way I am — I just go for it.’
Waif now a woman
Heads turn admiringly as she strides into a Sydney hotel, but she still can revel in the anonymity of womanhood. No one would recognise the waif of Montreal anymore.
Comaneci is working for a string of radio stations in Sydney. She, like fellow stars Muhammed Ali and Carl Lewis, is treading the well-worn corporate sponsors’ path. They keep on meeting up at ‘Legends of the 20th Century’ award ceremonies.
But this is not a champion who reflects on past glories — even that stunning day in Montreal when the computer scoreboard was so confused it gave her mark as 1.0. It had not been programmed for a perfect 10.
‘Today I am thinking only of my future. I don’t go back at all. People ask me ‘Do you ever watch your tapes?’ I say ‘No, I don’t watch my tapes’. They say ‘Do you look at your medals?’ I say ‘No, I don’t look at my medals’.
‘They are in a box. They came in a box and they are in a box. I don’t display them in the house.’ In a life lived early, she has found equanimity. She and Conner run a gymnastics academy in Oklahoma. It is an engrossing and rewarding job.
‘I have been at peace with myself for many years. I just feel that everything happened in a different life. I think that everybody’s life is a rollercoaster. If it is a perfect life, nobody cares.’
Romania still home
Comaneci, overjoyed that the Romanian women won the team gold in Sydney and Andrea Raducan the overall medal, still looks on Romania as home. She can now fly back whenever she likes.
‘The Romanian team were very consistent. There were no mistakes by any of the gymnasts. I was very happy as that had not happened since 1976 in Montreal,’ she said.
In Montreal, Comaneci won three gold medals, scored seven perfect tens and made history. ‘I had no pressure as a lot of people have nowadays. I wasn’t on the cover of Sports Illustrated before I went to the Olympics. I made all of them after. I don’t think there was pressure.
‘I think there was pressure in Moscow as defending a title is harder than winning a title. I left those games happy because I won two golds and two silvers which were not that bad.’
And today she is proud to be a role model.
‘With everything that happened starting with the escape and then making it into the United States and making it as a business person and having everything I wanted, being successful — I think that’s very important for all the other gymnasts to see.
‘If you do good in the Olympics, you have a medal, you have an opportunity to open doors and make a success of your life because I proved that.’
Paul Majendie
Source: SOCOG