NUNN OF MY BUSINESS
Why Olympic legend never dobbed in drug cheats
GOLD Coast track and field star Glynis Nunn-Cearns says she saw athletes being injected with substances during her sporting career but never said anything about it because “it was their problem”. “I saw needles being used in Australia and overseas, it was one of those things,” said Nunn-Cearns, who won gold medals at the 1982 Commonwealth Games and 1984 Olympics. Some of the athletes were later outed as drug cheats. The Gold Coast Commonwealth Games board member said she was proud to have achieved everything she had in sport without resorting to drugs.
OLYMPIC Games gold medallist Glynis Nunn-Cearns has revealed she saw track and field athletes openly receiving injections.
Nunn-Cearns, who won gold in the heptathlon at the 1984 Los Angeles Olympics, said she remembers at least four instances of leading athletes injecting substances into their shoulder areas during the early 1980s.
Now 56 and heavily involved with the development of young atheltes as executive director of the Gold Coast Academy of Sport, Nunn-Cearns speaks frankly about the drugs issue in an exclusive interview in today’s Bulletin.
Nunn-Cearns never said anything to authorities about the matter but remained a strong campaigner against drugs in sport.
“Yes, I saw needles being used in Australia and overseas, it was one of those things,” she said.
“You get told things – and I saw things – but until an athlete is proven positive then they’re fine. I did not think about saying anything to the authorities because it was the athletes’ morals. It was their problem, not mine.
“Did any of them get caught? Yes, but I’m not going to say who they were, although I will say they were involved in track and field.”
Nunn-Cearns also dropped a bombshell by saying she had once been told by an unnamed Australian coach that she would never get anywhere in the sport unless she “did drugs”.
“Needless to say I did not involve myself with him any further,” she said.
During her interview, Nunn-Cearns also spoke about her early life in Toowoomba on the Darling Downs and how she and her family put together a cross-country training track, complete with homemade equipment such as hurdles and long-jump sandpits that played a major role in her rise to the top.
She is now on the board of the Gold Coast 2018 Commonwealth Games Corporation.
AUSTRALIAN golden girl Glynis Nunn-Cearns completed a fairytale journey that began in the backblocks of a homemade training track south of Toowoomba and ended in glory at the Los Angeles Coliseum as the Olympic heptathlon champion. Nunn-Cearns remains heavily involved in athletics in both coaching and administrative levels. And she remains a harsh critic of drugs in sport.