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“I Felt And Saw Things We Shouldn’t Think About”, Olympic Triathlete Says After Swim In Seine
Belgian triathlete Jolien Vermeylenslammed the 2024 Paris Olympic Games organizers for making athletes compete in the highly polluted River Seine. Jolien finished 24th in the women’s event, which took place on Wednesday (July 31) after being postponed.
“I drank a lot of water, so we’ll know tomorrow if I’m sick or not,” the 30-year-old told TV channel VTM.
Highlights
- Jolien Vermeylen criticized the 2024 Paris Olympic Games organizers for making athletes swim in the highly polluted Seine River.
- The River Seine has been plagued with pollution for a century, and recent tests showed unacceptable levels of bacteria.
- Canadian athlete Tyler Mislawchuk vomited profusely after participating in the men's triathlon, spotlighting the river's poor conditions.
She continued: “It doesn’t taste like Coca-Cola or Sprite, of course. The Seine has been dirty for a hundred years, so they can’t say that the safety of the athletes is a priority. That’s bulls***!”
Jolien took precautions to avoid getting sick, but she admitted she took on quite a bit of water during the swim leg, Metro reported on Thursday (August 1).
She further revealed: “If the race hadn’t taken place, it would have been a disgrace for the organization, for Paris, for France.”
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Olympic triathlete slams 2024 Paris organizers for the unsanitary conditions of the Seine River after participating in an event
Image credits: Ezra Shaw/Getty
The incident comes just moments after another athlete, Canadian star Tyler Mislawchuk, was seen vomiting profusely on the finish line after participating in the men’s edition of the triathlon.
Prior to the event, the River Seine had been the center of a governmental project that sought to make its waters “swimmable” by 2025, not only for athletes but for the public as well.
The initiative involved multiple sanitization procedures and infrastructure rebuilding efforts with costs ascending upwards of $1.5 billion.
Image credits: Ezra Shaw/Getty
Despite the efforts, the measures have been deemed insufficient after its waters failed numerous tests checking for the presence of bacteria and other pollutants.
Heavy rainfall over the weekend worsened the quality of the stream, which forced the organizers of the event to postpone the race, originally set to take place on July 30, 2024.
“I took probiotics, I drank my Yakult, I couldn’t do more. I had the idea of not drinking water, but yes, it failed,” explained Vermeylen, making a reference to a fermented milk drink that promotes gut health.
The river has been subjected to numerous sanitization procedures, but tests months prior to the Olympic opening ceremony deemed the amounts of bacteria in it to be “unacceptable”
Image credits: jolien_vermeylen
Swimming in the River Seine has been prohibited for more than a century due to the presence of sewage, debris, and bacteria like E. coli, leading to health concerns about swimmers accidentally drinking the water.
Leading to the Olympics, experts reported concentrations of bacteria at unacceptable levels up until June 2024, with data showing that E. coli presence in the stream exceeded sports federation standards tenfold.
The aforementioned pathogen is often related to fecal matter, which the athlete alluded to having encountered while participating in the race. “While swimming under the bridge, I felt and saw things that we shouldn’t think about too much,” she stated.
Image credits: jolien_vermeylen
Vermeylen criticized the organization for allowing the race to take place in such conditions, but she understood the complex position they found themselves in, unable to further reschedule the event after its first cancellation.
“It was now or never, and they couldn’t cancel the race completely either. Now they just have to hope that there won’t be too many sick athletes,” she continued.
Vermeylen ended up in 24th place, with France’s Cassandre Beaugrand winning the gold medal in the women’s triathlon.
Viewers sympathized with the athlete’s concerns and took to the internet to express their distaste over the sanitary conditions of the event
Image credits: jolien_vermeylen
“Blame the Olympic committee who should have taken this into better consideration before awarding Paris the right to host. Too many under the table payments cause officials to look the other way and put people’s health at risk instead!” complained one reader.
“Rivers are sewers. Even with treatment plants for homes and businesses, runoff from streets and sidewalks goes directly there. Imagine the dog waste alone from Paris streets. This was a terrible idea,” stated another.
“Parts of the sewage system in Paris are hundreds of years old. To this day when toilets are flushed the contents go straight to the river. No treatment period,” said another, pointing to the rebuilding efforts that took place as part of the River Seine sanitization project.
“Fecalcoliform counts are high and the heavy rain dumped ‘floaters’ from the waste systems. Think of it as an obstacle course,” one viewer joked.
“A Canadian triathlete threw up 10 times on live TV after swimming in it,” mentioned another, pointing to an earlier incident involving a different athlete.
“Absolutely disgusting!” viewers reacted in desbelief at the decision by the 2024 Paris Olympics to allow athletes to swim in the River Seine
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What do you think ?
whiterabbit 1 year ago
I'm not a germaphobe by any means but I would be pissed if I was one of those swimmers. They train basically their entire lives for an opportunity to compete in the Olympics so it's not like they can just turn it down because they chose to make them compete in sewage water. Can you imagine if you were on your period and had to have a tampon in absorbing that nasty water? F that.
Traveling Lady Railfan 1 year ago
Since France is forcing the athletes to swim in e coli contaminated waters anyway, why didn't they just go with a full on "Phantom of the Opera" theme, and have the athletes swimming underneath the city in the sewers?
Robert Sumner 1 year ago
The direction of river water flows only one way, so the bulk of Paris could had readily been skipped by going upstream far enough. Even though French swimmers had to brave the same waters, organizers generally did not. That suggests political commentary on the laxness of someone at taking a more investigative interest in how to screen out and collect waste for a relatively brief period of time.
Mori LaChappelle 1 year ago
Why in the World wouldn't they have the Triathlon in Tahiti? They had the surf competition there, it would have been a beautiful backdrop and show the beauty of this French Colony. They could have done the event just off the Marina at Papeete, the Capital City at the opposite end of the island from the Surfing Venue. They missed a great opportunity and made all the athletes swim in the sewer for political reasons. Heads should be rolling for this faux paus....
Joyce Meyers 1 year ago
Why didn't all the athletes just not swim? What would the IOC do? "No croissants for you!"
SA stuff53 1 year ago
With all the hundreds of billions of dollars per year that france has literally been stealing from African nations, and installing troops on African soil to plunder their mines, and funding rebels to kill anyone who try and stop these thieves from stealing the Africa minerals, and installing military personnel there, to literally steal for france. Despite all that theft and thievery, france is still a dirty unsanitary place, which falsely markets itself as some kind of amazing place, the same way the rest of europe does, despite doing nothing but stealing from Africa, and installing puppet regimes in African nations, to steal Africa's minerals. france doesn't even have a sewage system. Nothing but useless thieves like the rest of europe, who are only good at stealing from Africa, and using the media to advertise lies to the public.
Upstaged75 1 year ago
The guy who puked has already said that the river is NOT why that happened. He pushed himself harder than usual and his body wasn't happy about it. It was also brutally hot outside.
Delmane Boshoff 1 year ago
I’m no germaphobe or anything like that. I’ve worked as a plumber myself for quite a number of years and hence know what sewerage systems hold and contain…. THIS, is an absolute disgrace to the IOC and the organisers at large. Were I any one of those athletes in the participating countries, I would have flatly refused to take part in that water and demand that it either be taken somewhere else is or cancelled in its entirety. Period. Seeing that one male athlete just about throw up half his damn intestines most likely caused by ingesting that fowl blooming water was enough to tell me that this event was NOT well thought out at all.
Judy Raymond 1 year ago
Paris has really f'd up the whole Olympics this year. I would suggest it never go back.
whiterabbit 1 year ago
I'm not a germaphobe by any means but I would be pissed if I was one of those swimmers. They train basically their entire lives for an opportunity to compete in the Olympics so it's not like they can just turn it down because they chose to make them compete in sewage water. Can you imagine if you were on your period and had to have a tampon in absorbing that nasty water? F that.
Traveling Lady Railfan 1 year ago
Since France is forcing the athletes to swim in e coli contaminated waters anyway, why didn't they just go with a full on "Phantom of the Opera" theme, and have the athletes swimming underneath the city in the sewers?
Robert Sumner 1 year ago
The direction of river water flows only one way, so the bulk of Paris could had readily been skipped by going upstream far enough. Even though French swimmers had to brave the same waters, organizers generally did not. That suggests political commentary on the laxness of someone at taking a more investigative interest in how to screen out and collect waste for a relatively brief period of time.
Mori LaChappelle 1 year ago
Why in the World wouldn't they have the Triathlon in Tahiti? They had the surf competition there, it would have been a beautiful backdrop and show the beauty of this French Colony. They could have done the event just off the Marina at Papeete, the Capital City at the opposite end of the island from the Surfing Venue. They missed a great opportunity and made all the athletes swim in the sewer for political reasons. Heads should be rolling for this faux paus....
Joyce Meyers 1 year ago
Why didn't all the athletes just not swim? What would the IOC do? "No croissants for you!"
SA stuff53 1 year ago
With all the hundreds of billions of dollars per year that france has literally been stealing from African nations, and installing troops on African soil to plunder their mines, and funding rebels to kill anyone who try and stop these thieves from stealing the Africa minerals, and installing military personnel there, to literally steal for france. Despite all that theft and thievery, france is still a dirty unsanitary place, which falsely markets itself as some kind of amazing place, the same way the rest of europe does, despite doing nothing but stealing from Africa, and installing puppet regimes in African nations, to steal Africa's minerals. france doesn't even have a sewage system. Nothing but useless thieves like the rest of europe, who are only good at stealing from Africa, and using the media to advertise lies to the public.
Upstaged75 1 year ago
The guy who puked has already said that the river is NOT why that happened. He pushed himself harder than usual and his body wasn't happy about it. It was also brutally hot outside.
Delmane Boshoff 1 year ago
I’m no germaphobe or anything like that. I’ve worked as a plumber myself for quite a number of years and hence know what sewerage systems hold and contain…. THIS, is an absolute disgrace to the IOC and the organisers at large. Were I any one of those athletes in the participating countries, I would have flatly refused to take part in that water and demand that it either be taken somewhere else is or cancelled in its entirety. Period. Seeing that one male athlete just about throw up half his damn intestines most likely caused by ingesting that fowl blooming water was enough to tell me that this event was NOT well thought out at all.
Judy Raymond 1 year ago
Paris has really f'd up the whole Olympics this year. I would suggest it never go back.
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