“Have ze Olympians swim in La Seine,” the French said. “Quel est le problème?” Le problème is that despite the country’s $1.5 billion infrastructure developments and Paris mayor Anne Hidalgo taking a dip herself, the actual athletes are not having a great time swimming in a body of water that very recently had a dangerously high level of E. coli.
Canadian athlete Tyler Mislawchuk came in ninth place in the men’s triathlon last week and went viral after he crossed the finish line and immediately started throwing up. “I vomited ten times after the race,” Mislawchuk later told Triathlon Magazine. He claims it was the heat that got to him, so we can’t entirely blame the Seine. However, the men’s triathlon was postponed a day due to concerns over the water quality following the rainstorm that occurred during the Opening Ceremony on Friday. Maybe they should have waited a few more days …
One male triathlete, American Seth Rider, had a special plan to combat the E. coli festering in the Seine. He stopped washing his hands. “We know that there’s going to be some E. coli exposure, so I just try to increase my E. coli threshold by exposing myself to a bit of E. coli in your day-to-day life,” Rider told the Athletic ahead of the Games. “And it’s actually backed by science. Proven methods. Just little things throughout your day, like not washing your hands after you go to the bathroom.” Rider wound up in 29th place, so you really do have to wonder if it was worth it.
In case you’re wondering, the women triathletes did not have a better time. In fact, Belgian triathlete Jolien Vermeylen made it sound like she had just lived through a horror film. “While swimming under the bridge, I felt and saw things that we shouldn’t think about too much,” she told the Flemish TV channel VTM, per Metro U.K.
“I drank a lot of water, so we’ll know tomorrow if I’m sick or not,” Vermeylen explained. “It doesn’t taste like Coca-Cola or Sprite, of course.” I wonder if it just tastes like normal river water (regular bad) or if it’s been supercharged by a century’s worth of sewage overflow (indescribably bad).
Vermeylen laid into the Olympics organizers for forcing athletes to compete in water they knew might not be totally clean. “The Seine has been dirty for a hundred years, so they can’t say that the safety of the athletes is a priority. That’s bullshit,” she said.
On Sunday, the Belgian Olympic team forfeited Monday’s mixed-competition triathlon. “The Belgian Hammers will not start in the Mixed Relay competition at the Paris Games tomorrow,” the team stated in a press release. “Claire Michel, one of the athletes in the mixed relay team, unfortunately has to withdraw from the competition due to illness.”
Michel fell ill after swimming in the Seine last week, with Belgian newspaper De Standaard reporting that she had been hospitalized and treated for E. coli. Marten Van Riel, one of Michel’s teammates, was quoted in De Standaard saying that the Paris Games were “a circus with athletes as puppets.”
Now, the triathletes only had to swim 1.5 kilometers in the Seine. This week, the marathon swimmers are diving in for their ten-kilometer race. That’s a little more than six miles in that water. I pray they all brought their Pepto!
This post has been updated.
