South Africa’s Olympic team arrive home from Athens on Tuesday morning carrying mixed emotions after an unforgettable experience in Greece.
The 28th Olympiad produced heart-stopping moments of glory for the South Africans who won six medals, the most since the Barcelona Olympics in 1992.
But there were also heart-wrenching moments involving administration and infrastructure that athletes would like to address for the sake of future teams.
Foremost in the minds of most, however, is the shine of gold that captured the imagination of the world watching the Olympics — especially the hosts of Hellas who celebrated a dizzying collective high when their team of underdogs fought through as top-dogs in European soccer.
Who would have expected the swimming foursome of Roland Schoeman, Lyndon Ferns, Damian Townsend and Ryk Neethling to swim a magical golden world record in the 4x100m freestyle?
Glory for the underdogs and the hosts loved every second of it as they recorded in their TV broadcasts and the front pages of their newspapers.
Schoeman said afterwards there was still unfinished business in the Olympic pool. He put words into action, churning the water to silver in the 100m freestyle, with Neethling also coming close to a medal, eclipsed by world-record breaker Ian Thorpe of Australia.
Then Schoeman struck again with bronze in the 50m and he became the most decorated Olympic swimmer in South African history.
You would have to travel far to witness the guts of rowers Donovan Cech and Ramon di Clemente who cut the agony of back injuries to win bronze in the rowing.
This, after little sleep over the controversy of the Canadian crew who invaded their lane in the semifinal. Protests and counter-claims ruled deep into the night before the final, then after four hours sleep the SA rowers went onto the water for their showdown.
Cech, particularly, suffered in the final and how he held out over the full 2 000m remains a mystery. Their final surge almost took the Croatians for silver and Cech could not get up for over half an hour.
The track and field athletes took up the challenge at the Olympic stadium and most fell like skittles with below-par performances until world high champion Hestrie Cloete and Mbulaeni Mulaudzi won silvers on the penultimate night of the Games.
Mulaudzi’s incredible fighting spirit earned him a 1:44,61 season’s best — the only other best of his season coming from Alwyn Myburgh in the 400m hurdles final.
Cloete, trying to lift herself to golden heights weighed down by the expectations of a nation, became tense under the pressure and conceded with 2,02m to Russia’s Yelena Slesarenko who cleared an Olympic record 2,06m.
She watched as Mulaudzi showed exceptional grit to lose by a heart beat to Russia’s Yuriy Borzakovskiy who took him on the outside. Myburgh’s 400m hurdles was a personal triumph by making the finals and finishing seventh in a season’s best 48,21sec.
Others who excelled were Alan van Coller making the semifinals in the 500m K1 canoe. There were also Kirsten Lewis making the second round of the knockout stages of the archery and Gershon Rorich and Colin Pocock becoming the first African side to make the elimination round in the beach volleyball.
Hockey captains Craig Jackson and Susan Webber also led their teams to play superb hockey. The scorelines did not reflect their high quality play in the tournament against exceptionally tough opposition that saw the women finish ninth (out of ten) and the men 10th (out of 12).
There were incidents, however, that took some shine off the medals.
A cloud descended after Schoeman requested that sponsors be found to offer better financial support for elite swimmers in the build-up to the Beijing Olympics in 2008. He was taken out of context, especially by Swimming SA president Gideon Sam who responded from Johannesburg with words that came down on the swimmers like a hammer.
And it went on. The swimmers were hauled into a press conference where they read prepared statements to soften the situation.
Then there was the case involving highly-talented Godfrey Mokoena, the 19-year-old world junior triple jump champion, who arrived 90 minutes late for his qualifying event and could not warm up and team management, who woke him up 40 minutes before midnight, refused to take responsibility.
Earlier Hestrie Cloete had to catch a bus from the airport to the Olympic Village after the car sent for her failed to connect with her because of tight security.
Instead of being transparent, they made matters worse by sending out a prepared statement by the world champion, explaining that she simply caught the bus, as did other athletes who arrived after the team had landed.
Marathon runner Hendrik Ramaala was fetched, but fellow-marathoners Ian Syster and Gert Thys were left waiting after their arrival.
Another matter still to be resolved is that of Robbie Hunter who failed to finish the road race and entered into the road time trial during the Olympics, then was suddenly withdrawn from the 48km time trial because Nocsa claimed he had not qualified.
Coaches of individual athletes also had a rough time getting to their athletes, some not gaining access into the training track inside the village, others spending almost six hours on a round trip on the system of trams, trains and buses from the team hotel to work with their athletes.
There were coaches who could not even get tickets to see their athletes in action.
Promises were made as far back as Atlanta 1996, that SA would adopt a system of sports academies based on the Australian model.
Nothing was done and despite the six medals won here, the signs are stark that SA is being left behind in Olympic sport.
There is a saying among South Africans in Athens that the sport no longer needs politicians in track suits running sport. – Sapa