YELLOW PERIL
MARICICA PUICA WON OLYMPIC GOLD IN A RACE BEST REMEMBERED FOR AN ATHLETE WHO FELL, WRITE JASON HENDERSON AND NATALIA DONETS
MARK SHEARMAN
HE WOMEN’S 3000m at the 1984 Olympics is famous for Zola Budd’s tangle with Mary Decker – a collision that left the American on the floor and out of the race. In the melee, Maricica Puica sped to victory and now, more than 30 years later, insists she would have won even if Decker had not fallen.
“Even if Mary would have continued the race, she wouldn’t have won it either way,” says Puica in a new book out this week called Collision Course. “Mary wasn’t in good shape. She wasn’t prepared.
Los Angeles 1984: Maricica Puica (left) out-sprinted Wendy Sly for gold in the 3000m after Mary Decker had fallen after a mid-race collision with Zola Budd
I’m convinced that she did not rise up to continue because she understood that she couldn’t do anything about the final outcome. I was in such good shape that I was ready for a 3000m world record.”
The race was billed by the media as a head-to-head between Decker and Budd. The American was the golden girl of American track and field, reigning world champion and multiple world record-holder and had grown up in Los Angeles, whereas Budd was a teenage prodigy wearing hastily-organised British colours after controversially switching countries from South Africa and, famously, no shoes on her feet.
Yet most experts quietly predicted Puica to be Decker’s No.1 rival. She was eight years older than the American, 16 years older than Budd and possessed a strong sprint finish in addition to showing huge stamina to take the world cross country title in 1982 and 1984. In the absence of so many Communist nations due to the boycott of the LA Games, she was also the Eastern Bloc’s main challenger as they took on the Westerners.
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