Czech gymnast Caslavska dies

PRAGUE: Czech gymnast Vera Caslavska, her country’s most celebrated Olympian and one of the most powerful voices in its struggle against Soviet occupation, has died aged 74 of pancreatic cancer.

One of only two women to win back-to-back gold medals as the best all-round gymnast, Caslavska took seven golds in all at the 1964 Olympics in Tokyo and the 1968 Games in Mexico City. In the latter she competed against and beat Soviet athletes just weeks after Warsaw Pact tanks led by the Red Army swept into then Czechoslovakia to put down attempts to reform Communist rule. “We went to Mexico determined to sweat blood to defeat the invaders’ representatives,” she told news website Aktualne.cz in a 2014 interview. A lasting memory of those games is Caslavska’s silent protest of bowing her head while on the podium when the Soviet anthem played - echoing the more famous image of the Black Power salute that US sprinter Tommie Smith gave in solidarity with African American civil rights.

“Vera was a fighter. She was diagnosed last year in the spring,” said Czech Olympic Committee President Jiri Kejval, who announced her death. “When she did not come with us to (the) Rio (Games) it was clear the situation was bad,” he told Reuters by telephone, adding Caslavska had died in her sleep.