Letters to a Young Gymnast

by Nadia Comaneci

  You want to know about the darkness in a sport that was always filled with light for me. I can’t answer your questions about anorexia and gymnastics because though I can sympathize with gymnasts who experience eating disorders, once again I can’t relate. First, in Romania, most gymnasts considered themselves lucky to get three good meals a day. Second, we weren’t in charge of our diets. The team doctor decided all of our meals, and we simply ate them because we didn’t know there was any other choice. Third, there were no trips to the candy store (we didn’t have a candy store, and even if we had, we didn’t have much money for sweets) or late-night bingeing on food at sleepovers. Of course, like any kids, we did try to sneak candy and other sweets we were given by friends into the dorm, and we succeeded sometimes. But our movements were quite controlled, and there was no way we could gain weight with the amount of exercise we did.

  The truth is that if we had gained too much weight, we would not have been great gymnasts and could have gotten hurt. Only by balancing calories can any gymnast maintain her weight and delay puberty. Puberty can end a girl’s career, and overweight gymnasts, no matter how talented, can’t be as powerful or graceful as competitors who maintain a healthier body weight. This is just a fact. My friend, it might seem unfair, but a soccer player needs power and muscles; a football player must be fast, strong, and sometimes heavier than he desires; a skater needs graceful lines; and gymnasts must be light and lean.

  As a result of eating well and being under the guidance of a physician, I was given the gift of a strong body and bones, though my mother of course attributes these things to a different source. She loves to remind me that she is most responsible for my health, saying that when I was born, I took everything good out of her body. I understand that there are real consequences for young gymnasts who do not eat a healthy, well-balanced diet. I urge parents to look at their child’s psyche, body type, and nutritional needs when helping that child decide if a career in gymnastics is the right choice for his or her physical and emotional well-being.

  I have tried to answer your questions about the emotional and physical tolls of gymnastics from my own perspective. I have written about overcoming challenges and winning the gold at the European Championships just five months after my poor showing at the 1978 Worlds. Although I’ve expressed how gymnastics has affected my life in countless positive ways, you are understandably still very curious about the one time I mentioned when I did ignore my body’s pain signals. Before I tell you what really happened in Fort Worth, let me say that though I pushed the envelope that day, I believe I was never in danger of serious injury. One of the reasons my gymnastics career was so long and successful was because of the common sense I exhibited.

  After the Worlds and the European Championships, I spent the next few months training and competing, with success after success. I had achieved a higher level of fitness than ever before and believed my results at the World Championships in Fort Worth would be no different. But there were problems before our team ever arrived in Texas. The Romanian government sent us to Mexico a month before the Worlds to train in a gymnasium on U.S. apparatus they’d purchased, to make certain we would be comfortable going into the competition. The differences in the equipment were very small, but even tiny things such as the feel of the floor material and the measurement systems of the vault and bars can throw off a gymnast when the pressure is on. They also wanted us to get used to the heat and humidity, since the climate in Mexico was similar to that in Texas. But instead of getting prepared, we got a vicious stomach flu. Suffering from diarrhea and nausea, it was difficult to train. I lost almost 10 pounds and was incredibly weak.

  I didn’t like being far away from home for so long. I wrote letters to my mom, telling her I was homesick and disliked the spicy food. Plus, the new generation of gymnasts on my team was coming up, and it was time for me to move on. While traveling, I had to live under the rules Bela imposed on the younger gymnasts even though I was eighteen years old. I obeyed him but didn’t like the restrictions. Once again, we began to have small disagreements.

  The entire team looked gaunt and pale when we arrived in Texas. The Western media immediately wrote that we were no longer the energetic, cute little girls of the past; we looked starved and unhappy. Unfortunately, they never bothered to ask our coaches why we appeared so sickly. At the time, none of us realized that the media were talking about us or that people were focused on the way we looked. I forced myself through the compulsories—I was the team leader, and the younger gymnasts depended on me to set an example. If I could do it, they could, too. Going into the optionals, we were five-tenths of a point behind the Russians. Despite our poor health, we had a chance to win the team gold, but I had an additional problem I’d been ignoring that was going to threaten our chances and my own ability to compete.

  I had scratched myself with the buckle of my hand guards during practice toward the end of our stay in Mexico, and I think that chalk, friction, sweat, and dirt caused an infection. A small, red bump began to form. It grew bigger and bigger and started to get inflamed. I thought I should massage it—which only made it worse. It became more and more difficult to bend my arm. By the time I entered the arena for the optional portion of the competition, my wrist was red and very swollen, and I was in considerable pain.

  When Bela saw my injury, he instructed me to see what I could do on each apparatus during the warm-up period. I tried to do my bar routine, but my wrist was too swollen, and I had no range of motion or strength. Bela told me to just touch each apparatus when I was called for every event so that I could remain in the competition. (If I didn’t present myself to the judges and touch the equipment, I would have been disqualified.) When the rest of the team saw my inability to perform, they fell apart. They’d lost their leader, and all of their inexperience and fears overwhelmed them. But a huge smile lit Bela’s face, and he gave one of his famous pep talks.

  “You can win the floor, beam, bars, and vault. You can win the individual all-around as well as the team all-around title. Go for it, dammit! If you want to prove that you’ve been working hard, preparing hard, then go out there and eat them up. Are you afraid of those suckers! . . . I guarantee you that nobody, nobody worked harder for this competition than you have.... Do your best. Can we do it?!”

  The team was fired up. And it is a fact that their scores were high and that they were poised to beat the Russians. At the start of every event, I presented myself to the judges and touched each apparatus, then sat back down. My compulsory scores from the previous day (which were carried over to the optionals and added to the gymnast’s total score) were so high that had I performed, I could have fallen a couple of times and probably still won. But there was no need for me to compete until the beam, when one of our gymnasts fell. Suddenly, my score was necessary for the win.

  Bela recalls turning to me and asking, “Nadia, did you ever think that you had any obligations to your team members? I have to tell you that you do have obligations,’cause all of these little guys carried all the hard parts of your victories. These are the ones who built your scores for so many years. These are the ones who have never been recognized for that. These are the silent soldiers who carried the hard part of your glory. . . . Did you ever think that you owed me or Marta anything for what has happened over the years? If you truly feel that for all our work and consideration you owe us something, then walk up right now and do a beautiful thing . . . do your beam routine.”

  Of that moment when I talked to Bela before attempting my beam routine, I only vaguely remember him asking me after my teammate fell if I could compete. Of course I said yes because Bela believed I could and because the team needed me to perform. I told Bela that I couldn’t do the mount, since it required pressure on both my hands, but that I would make up a different mount. My friend, even if I fell, I might still have had a chance to push the team over the top. I didn’t need a pep talk or any convincing; I would have supported my teammates no matter what. We always helped e
ach other like sisters, and if it was possible for me to perform without killing myself, I’d try. After so many years, I had a bit of knowledge stored up about how much I could do.

  Looking back, I know that my beam performance was not really a sacrifice for my team or my coach. The routine wasn’t painful if I didn’t bend my arm. And because I was using my right hand most of the time, I could avoid some pain on my left by putting most of the pressure on my right hand during skills such as back handsprings. I had no fear because I wasn’t sure what was going to happen, so consequently, I didn’t make any mistakes.

  Today, Bela says that he never believed it was truly possible for me to perform well that day. Despite the fact that the beam was a leg event and that I could do one-handed handstands and handsprings, he didn’t think I’d be capable of performing. But it is a fact that I did perform that day on the beam. I used three fingers from my damaged hand to balance through skills, and though I felt some pain, concentration blotted out most of it. I never fell, and I stuck my dismount. My score was 9.95, and my team returned to first place. I couldn’t compete in the rest of the events, but we still won the all-around team title.

  I do not believe that I risked permanent damage to my arm that day. I do not believe that Bela would ever have put me in that position. But I do believe that my sense of team obligation and my desire to fulfill my coach’s expectation had something to do with my decision to perform. I wonder, today, if it was even a decision back then, or if I just followed Bela’s orders because that is what I always did. It’s impossible to know.

  So, I guess there’s the answer to your question, friend. I don’t believe I ever sacrificed my health for a single competition. There was nothing heroic about my efforts that day. No pain, no gain. Sounds simple and trite, but it’s true. If an athlete doesn’t have some pain, it means she hasn’t worked hard enough. At the Worlds, I made informed decisions based on my own knowledge and a level of trust in those around me.

  That night after the optionals, I went to the hospital and had surgery on my wrist. The doctors gave me a general anesthetic and cleaned out the infection, which had traveled up my arm in red lines. I remained in the hospital for a day and then left with a drain still implanted in my arm because the doctors didn’t think the cut was ready to be completely closed. I flew home with the team, and a group of doctors was waiting when I arrived in Bucharest. They wanted to take me to the hospital, but I insisted on returning to my home in Deva. A nurse accompanied me, and when my wound had drained completely, she stitched me up.

  Today, I have a two-inch scar from the Worlds. I also have the knowledge that I faced adversity and thrived. I could easily have refused to compete, but I’m not that kind of person. If I say I can’t do something, I’m lying and cheating myself of the results of my efforts. Some people say that it’s because of all the extra efforts I made as a child that I became better than everyone else. Don’t be fooled, though, I have always looked out for myself.

  Here is a little secret, friend. Throughout my years of training and competition, I always kept a reserve of energy. Let’s say that I knew that I could do fifteen laps of the stadium. I’d tell Bela I could do ten and give myself some reserve, some padding. Even if he’d say that I should do twelve, that meant I was capable of doing three more. I worked out in pain, but I knew the difference between pain that was tolerable and pain that didn’t help me and lessened my abilities. I followed my instincts, as I always have, and they led me to safety. You seem to want me to tell you what is unhealthy or too much for other gymnasts. I cannot answer that question. Bela pushed me hard, but the reason he could never break me is because he never truly knew my limits.

  ■ Courage?

  The Romanian team’s conditioning exercises for the uneven bars were intense. Every day, we did three sets of five glide kip casts to handstands, which require the gymnasts to support their entire bodies on the bars with their arms by leaning their shoulders forward and kicking their heels backward into a handstand. We also did three sets of ten V-ups, which are like sit-ups except the gymnast hangs from the high bar and pikes her feet to her face.

  In addition to conditioning exercises, we worked on dozens of different sequences from our bar routines each day. We’d do three tricks in a row or start near the end of a routine and do the final elements and then our dismounts. Plus, we’d do five complete exercises each day, two in the morning and three in the afternoon. Our entire time on the bars was one hour and fifteen minutes per day. Working on the uneven bars is extremely strenuous, and spending any more time than this would have been too much for our bodies to handle.

  When I returned to Deva after the 1979 World Championships in Texas, I was confused. I was too old to continue traveling with the young gymnasts on my team and to live under Bela and Marta’s rule. I could no longer be a marionette and let others pull my strings. I wanted to be in control. But control is an illusion, especially in a Communist country. That was one of the lessons that I had to learn again and again, until I finally listened to what God (or whatever higher power you choose to believe in) was saying to me. It happens a lot in life—you get whispered to, tapped on the shoulder, knocked over the head, maybe even flattened by a car . . . until you finally hear what you were supposed to have learned long ago and then make a change.

  Back in Deva, I continued to live with my mother. She had a good friend who became a sort of mentor to me. He asked me upon my return if I had given more thought to going to a university. I said no, and he replied that if I wanted to do more with my life, I needed an education. People with diplomas were hired first, and gold medals wouldn’t get me a job. What university? I asked him. He suggested the Polytechnic Institute in Bucharest, where you could receive a college degree in sports education as well as a host of other sports-related fields. I was nineteen and decided to push through one more year of gymnastics and then apply to the university. I wanted to compete in the 1980 Olympic Games, but I was done with living and training in Deva. Bela and Marta gave me their blessings, and I returned to Bucharest.

  As you’ll learn soon enough, nothing comes without a price. I trained hard in Bucharest, but I was also fighting a problem with sciatica and had pain down my leg. Sometimes I couldn’t feel one of my toes because the nerve was being pinched. I did a lot of physical therapy and slept on a hard surface. Instead of forcing anything, I did the minimum necessary to get by and be able to compete. Mostly, the pain bothered me when I was sitting, not training. But I stayed away from any specific gymnastic skills that would make it worse.

  Most gymnasts have trouble with their backs, but after that bout with sciatica, I never did again, though I don’t know why. As I said, I survived gymnastics with almost no repercussions. It wasn’t until 1994, during an exhibition gymnastics show in Wyoming, that I was finally injured. Earlier that day, I’d learned that Monica Seles had been stabbed on a tennis court in Germany. I was upset and had been thinking about her all day. During my exhibition routine, I was doing a double twist on the floor and lost my concentration. I should have been thinking about my performance and, at that moment, my landing, not Monica. I felt something snap and heat in my knee. With a sense of shock, I motioned for help.

  What a strange sensation that was; the gymnasium was a world where I had total control . . . up until that moment. Funny how we are misled into thinking we have any control at all. For me, it was so easy to think of myself as invincible. I had never broken a bone, and I was certain that’s what I’d done in Wyoming because I had no reference point for the pain. I’m going to have some kind of surgery, I thought as I was helped off the mat. My instincts were still intact. And I did wind up having knee surgery. It was a success.

  I would like to say a bit about my mother here because she, too, has always had great instincts. It was my mother who insisted on saving all the money I made during my gymnastics career, whereas I, like any kid, would have spent it. When I moved to Bucharest in 1979, my mother and brother again came with me. We needed a
place to live and heard that there was a lady who wanted to leave the country because her husband had defected and she planned to join him. We bought her house. We could never have afforded even a quarter of the cost without the funds my mother had saved up from the monetary awards I’d received in competitions. The government, over the years, had retained a percentage of money from my salary to pay for my room and board, and by combining our savings and that money, we were able to make a down payment on the house. I figured by the time I was sixty years old, I might actually own it free and clear.

  My “salary” in Romania equaled about US $100 a month. I couldn’t afford to pay for the heat in the house, so my mother got a job as a cashier at a local store. The house was still too large to heat in its entirety (it had three bedrooms), so my mother, brother, and I lived and slept in the kitchen during the winter. Meanwhile, the government continued to retain a percentage of my salary to make monthly mortgage payments on our home.

  As I’ve told you, one of the biggest misperceptions about my life in Romania is that I was living like royalty. The truth is that when I moved from Deva back to Bucharest, I did not even want to have any friends because I didn’t want them to know just how poor I was. I didn’t want them to see that I didn’t have all that they might have imagined. I was ashamed because I was an Olympic champion training for the next Games and people expected me to have everything.