6 1 ‘ ,
Flagbearer sees himself as lucky man
by Robbi Pickeral
September 14, 2000
Knight-Ridder Newspapers
SYDNEY _ Cliff Meidl remembers little of
the accident that changed his life. He was told
he struck three unmarked high-voltage cables
while operating a jackhammer. He was told
his body absorbed 30,000 volts of electricity
—l5 times the charge of an electric chair.
He was told, 14 years ago, that he would
never walk again.
"1 consider myself an extremely lucky
man," said Meidl, an Olympic kayaker who
will lead the U.S. delegation marching
as flagbearer at the opening ceremonies.
Lucky in more ways that one.
Cyclist Lance Armstrong, basketball player
Teresa Edwards and University of Minnesota
alumnus Mike Wherley, a rower, were in
cluded in the list of 10 finalists in the
flagbearer selection. Lance Deal, a hammer
thrower, is the alternate. But it was Meidl's
story —as inspiring as it is gory that earned
him an honor reserved for the athlete that best
exemplifies both American and Olympic
spirit.
"It was always a dream for me to be in the
Olympics," said Meidl, 34. "But I never
thought I'd be a flagbearer, and I'm really ex
cited about the whole thing."
Meidl was 20 years old, and working his
way through college as a plummer's assistant
in 1986, when he struck three unmarked high
voltage cables with a jackhammer while punc
turing a hole for water lines. He remembers
drilling, and then everything went black.
The electricity blew Meidl out of the hole,
then back into it. A co-worker tried to pull him
out, but was shocked himself. He was saved
only when someone turned off the power.
"The doctors have told me they don't know
how I survived," Meidl said. "They think that
because I was relatively young 20 at the
time my heart was neither too mature nor
too young, so I was able to withstand the three
cardiac arrests. Also, it was an enormous
amount of luck."
The blast blew off one of Meidl's big toes,
blew open a portion of his skull, and badly
burned his back. He later lost a second toe
from gangrene. But his knees were the worst.
Two athletes are sent home af-
ter testing positive for drugs
by Alan Abrahamson
September 20, 2000
Los Angeles Times
SYDNEY, Australia - In the latest Olympic
disgrace involving the nation of Bulgaria and
the sport of weightlifting, a Bulgarian lifter
was stripped Wednesday of his silver medal
and sent packing because he tested positive
for a substance often used to mask the use
of drugs.
Ivan Ivanov, 28, who Saturday won silver
in the bantamweight division, tested posi
tive for the diuretic furosemide, the Interna
tional Olympic Committee announced.
lOC Director General Francois Carrard
said Ivanov had already left the Olympic
Village. Carrard also announced Wednesday
that Vadim Devyatovsky of Belarus, a ham
mer thrower, had been kicked out of the
Games after testing positive for traces of the
banned steroid nandrolone.
These are the first athletes banned as a re
sult of tests conducted during the Games.
Several others have been suspended follow
ing pre-Games tests, according to Prince
Alexandre de Merode of Belgium, chairman
of the lOC's medical commission.
Diuretics help the body flush itself of flu
ids. Cheaters use diuretics to hide the pres
ence of performance-enhancing drugs.
Nandrolone builds muscles and helps ath
letes recover faster from hard training.
Weightlifting is so contaminated by drug
use that a few years back Olympic officials
considered taking it off the program.
The Bulgarians have their own sorry his
tory. At the 1988 Games in Seoul, South Ko
rea, Mitko Grablev won the bantamweight
division and Angel Genchev the lightweight.
Then Grablev was disqualified - after test
ing positive for a diuretic. Two days later,
Genchev was disqualified for the same rea
son.
After the announcement of Genchev's test,
Bulgarian officials withdrew the rest of their
Skin was gone, but so was tendon and joint.
When the doctors took protective casts off his
legs the next day, they found raw bone.
Doctors initially wanted to amputate both
of Meidl's legs, but his parents wouldn't let
them. Finally, they found a plastic surgeon at
the UCLA Medical Center who was willing
to try a radical procedure: cutting his calf
muscles and attaching them to his knees.
When Meidl woke up 12 hours after the
blast, his chest hurt. Several of his ribs had
been broken by all the CPR.
"It felt like I'd been hit by a truck," he said.
The worst was yet to come.
He stayed in the hospital for roughly 2 1/2
months, moving from bed to wheelchair, then
wheelchair to crutches. He stayed on the stilts
for the next three years.
"I definitely suffered through the 'why me's'
and 'why not someone else' thoughts," he said.
"But I had to realize that was not the way to
go. The negative feelings were much greater
after the accident. They have lessened as time
goes by. I try to think of things in a positive
way."
Rehab helped. Realizing that his former fa
vorite sports track and cross country run
ning were no longer in his future, Meidl
turned to paddling outrigger canoes in 1987,
about a year after the accident. In 1996, in his
first Olympic Games in Atlanta, Meidl's
flatwater team was eliminated in the semifi
nals, but Meidl came back for a second try.
"I think a lot of it has been determination,"
Meidl said. "I used will to be able to get from
not being able to use my legs, and transferred
that to kayaking."
Meidl, who lives in Los Angeles, still has
the clothes he wore the day he was electro
cuted. His mother saved them, and he keeps
them in a suitcase in his office.
He also has leftover scars from the accident,
mental as well as physical. He has nightmares
sometimes. He will always walk with a limp.
Still, Meidl said, he wouldn't change any
thing.
"It is unfortunate to say that traumatic ex
periences bring out the best in us, but they do,"
he said. "I don't know what I would have done
if I hadn't had the accident, but I'm very proud
to be here today. I'm proud of myself and proud
of my country."
weightlifters from the Games.
The International Weightlifting Federa
tion, aiming to distance itself from the stain
of drugs, actually went so far as to change
all weight categories after the 1992 Olym
pics. That wiped out all world and Olympic
records and gave federation officials the op
portunity to boast that they were "starting
clean."
Another shuffling of the weight catego
ries occurred after the 1996 Atlanta Games.
Even before Ivanov's expulsion, events at
the Sydney Games had already further
strained the sport's credibility.
On Sunday, the lOC said it had kicked out
the entire Romanian weightlifting team be
cause three lifters - including two on the
Olympic team - had failed drug tests this
year. Under the federation's "three strikes"
policy, the entire team had to go, the lOC
said.
On Monday, the federation lifted the ban
on five "clean" lifters after the Romanian
Olympic Committee agreed to a $50,000
payment, dubbed a "fine." Such a waiver is
included in the federation's rules.
The Bulgarian Ivanov, meantime, had been
so delighted at winning silver that he had
kissed the barbell after clinching second
place - behind Halil Mutlu of Turkey, who
pound for pound may be the world's best
lifter. The current bantamweight class is for
men under 56 kilos, or 123 pounds.
Mutlu, who stands 4-foot-11, lifted a com
bined total - in the snatch and in the clean
and-jerk - of 305 kilos, or 671 pounds.
Though he lifts for Turkey, he hails from Bul
garia.
By comparison, Ivanov lifted a combined
total of 292 1/2 kilos, or 643 1/2 pounds.
With Ivanov out, the silver medal will go
to Wu Wenxiong of China. China's Zhang
Xiangxiang was elevated from fourth to
third.
Carrard said the lOC intends to redo the
medal ceremony.
ELECTRIFYING ENTRANCE. The United States Flag Bearer Cliff Meidl makes his
way up the steps past the Australian Marching Band after the USA team took its
place on the field during Opening Ceremonies of the 25th Summer Olympic Games
in Sydney, Friday September 15.
'Cs
PHOTO BY KAREN T. BORCHERS (TMS)
FRIDAY, SEPTEMBER 22, 2000
Total
Medal Counts
Country
D
United States 10
Australia 7
China 6
France 6
Russia
Italy
Germany
Korea
Britain
Netherlands
Ukraine
Japan
Bulgaria
Cuba
Slovakia
Romania
Switzerland
Czech Rep.
Belarus
Spain
Brazil
Turkey
Hungary
Poland
Sweden
Canada
North Korea
Greece
South Africa
Chinese Taipei
Belgium
Costa Rica
Indonesia
Croatia
Lithuania
Mexico
Colombia
Yugoslavia
Uruguay
Nigeria
Kyrgyzstan
Georgia
Latvia
Thailand
Estonia
Portugal
India
Kuwait
100 Years Ago...
Paris 1900
Dates: May 14 - October 28
Participants: 1225
O 6 Men; 19 Women; 26 Countries)
Sports: 24
Events: 166
1 France
2 USA
3 Great Britain 17 8 10
4 Belgium
5 Switzerland 6 2 1
Top Athletes
Name (Country) Discipline
Alvin Kraenzlein (USA) Athletics
Konrad Staheli (SUI) Shooting
Ray Ewry (USA) Athletics
Irving Baxter (USA) Athletics
Walter Tewksbury (USA)Athletics
Gold Silver Bronze
29 41 32
20 14 9
8 7 5