She is a legend on the track who has achieved everything that one can dream of and then some. As part of a handful in the world to have achieved the double in the Olympics, Marie Jose Perec has scaled to the top of the mountain. But, it is the way that she did it that keeps her apart from the lot.
Hailing from a remote island of Guadeloupe, Perec, nicknamed ‘The Gazelle’ for her long and graceful strides, broke into the scene in 1991 before capturing the Olympic gold the following year in Barcelona. She cemented her name in the annals of history in the following edition in Atlanta where she snared the yellow metal for both 400 m and 200 m events.
But through it all, she always had an eye on the rearview mirror, never forgetting her humble beginnings and the support from her family — the cornerstone on which she built her towering career.
“When we were kids, our activities were fishing because I we lived close to a river. To come from this background, from a family that was not into sport, was huge. My family accompanied me without knowing about these activities. My mom sometimes told me, ‘I don’t know what pleasure you get from doing these things. But if you’re happy, just go. We’re behind you,’” revealed the Frenchwoman who retired a decade ago.
“The only thing that I can say is that I always enjoyed running. When I was seven or eight years old, my house was behind my school. We had to go home for lunch. We used to have races in the lunch break on the bridge. I would eat very quickly and go, begging my mom to let me go. Years later, someone discovered that I was born for that,” she remarked with a nostalgic smile.
Often called a diva for her penchant to speak her mind and her strong opinions, through it all, Perec was thinking beyond herself. “I’m a shy person. So in the beginning, it was very hard for me to be placed in this type of life. But at the same time, I also said to myself that for those coming after me, I had to stand up and show them that no matter where you come from or what your life was before, you can achieve your dreams,” she said.
With doping charges mounting in athletics, the 47-year-old believes that family life and values that are taught early in life can go a long way in cleaning up the sport. “I think it is the responsibility of everyone. The federation has to do their job and the parents also have to do their job. I remember my grandma, who was above 80, didn’t know anything about sports but she would watch me. In the beginning of my career, she saw me on TV and I arrived at the finish line and someone gave me a bottle of water and I drank it. When I called, my grandma said: ‘Good job. Let me tell you something, people don’t drink (from) bottles like that. You don’t know where this bottle came from!’” she recalls, adding, “She had these things to tell me and then I thought to myself: ‘I am 20-years-old. It is not her job to tell me that. I have to take my place and stand on my own feet and think about what I am doing because I might get into problems just because I am not aware of what I am doing. This has to start from there,’” remarked the lanky sprinter.
“When you win a race and you know that you took something, it is like you are lying to yourself. You don’t exactly know what your body can give you. I did not grow up like that. I grew up in a way that my parents would have killed me if I had done something like that. I would have never put my family in such a spot. It would be a shame,” she added. With her early life and the values shaping her character, Perec is keen to provide the same support for her son Nolan.
“One thing that I learned from my parents is that you have to let your child live his own life. I allow my son to discover a lot of different activities like sports, piano and all kinds of activities and he can chose what he wants to do in life. I am not pushing him in anyway. I will just leave him in peace and he can decide whatever he loves to do. I don’t know if we will succeed because to educate a kid, there is no book for that, we all go with what we feel,” she signs off.
