Through observations, winks and anecdotes, the Carnets de Paris immerse you in the heart of the Olympic Games.
They fly like the wind, but unfortunately not everything moves so quickly.
Quebec’s Audrey Leduc made no mistake in her debut at the Paris Olympics on Friday. The Gatineau sprinter led her heat in the first qualifying round in the 100 metres, and in the process lowered her own Canadian record by a tenth of a second, to 10.95 seconds.
The 25-year-old athlete has been preceded by many women before her, all of whom tried to gain seconds to become among the fastest in the world, while at the same time slowly making progress in their place alongside the men.
It was at the Amsterdam Games in 1928, almost 100 years ago, that women were first allowed to compete in athletics. The photo of the finish of the 100-metre final is one of the most famous in the history of women’s struggle for equality at the Games. It shows a young woman about to cross the finish line, her arms in the air and a beaming smile.
American Betty Robinson was a 16-year-old student who had been spotted by a teacher just a few months earlier while trying to catch her train. She would go on to win gold and tie the world record with a time of 12.2 seconds. She probably would have won again at the Los Angeles Games four years later if a plane crash a year before the Games had not left her seriously injured. Unable to bend her knee enough to get into the starting position after the tragedy, she would nevertheless return to the Berlin Games in 1936 to be part of the team that won the 4×100-meter relay.
What is rarely noticed and never emphasized is that in the famous 1928 photo, a radiant Betty Robinson is just ahead of a grimacing opponent whose sweater bears a large maple leaf. Born in Dnipro, Ukraine, Fanny “Bobbie” Rosenfeld was one of only six women on the Canadian team that year, dubbed “the Incomparable Six.” Also among them was Ethel Smith, the runner who would round out the 100-metre podium that day. The two pioneers would go on to be part of the quartet that won the gold medal in the 4×100-metre relay and set a new world record of 48.4 seconds.
Back in Canada, Bobbie Rosenfeld would play hockey and softball for a time before arthritis forced her to become a coach and then a sports journalist. Selected in 1950 as Canada’s Female Athlete of the Half-Century, she would leave her name on the award given each year by The Canadian Press to the outstanding female athlete of the year.
Paris-Kabul
But let’s get back to the preliminary rounds of the 100 meters at the Paris Olympics, the first officially equal between male and female athletes. A few minutes before Audrey Leduc entered the stage, another sprinter, Kimia Yousofi, unfortunately could not do better than a time of 13.2 seconds, which will not allow her to go further in the competition.
As at the Tokyo Games, the 28-year-old is wearing the colours of Afghanistan and was even the flag bearer at last week’s opening ceremony. But she now lives in Australia to escape persecution by the Taliban in power in Kabul. In Paris, she says she wants to represent “the stolen dreams and aspirations” of the women of her country.
Selected by the International Olympic Committee in consultation with the Afghan Olympic Committee, most of whose members are in exile, the Afghan delegation includes three women and three men. “Only three athletes represent Afghanistan,” a Taliban government sports spokesman told Agence France-Presse, referring to the three men.
This report was financed with the support of the Transat International Journalism Fund-The duty.