- Leonie Beck is the next in a series of athletes to speak out about the River Seine
- She says she vomited nine times and had diarrhea the day after her 10K race.
- The German athlete posted on Instagram Stories to express her discontent
A German Olympian has claimed she vomited nine times and suffered diarrhoea after swimming in the River Seine, raising new alarm over her fitness for the sport.
Leonie Beck finished ninth in Thursday’s women’s marathon swimming event, in which athletes battle it out in the water for 10 kilometres and more than two hours.
Around £1.2bn was spent cleaning up a river that had been banned from swimming for 100 years before the Games but which as recently as June had levels of E. coli bacteria 10 times higher than permitted.
Previous triathlons at the Olympics have been delayed due to concerns about water quality but have ultimately gone ahead and the women’s 10km event has met safety thresholds following testing.
However, Beck spoke out about the horrific health issues he faced just a day after the event.
German athlete Leonie Beck said she “vomited nine times” and had “diarrhea” after swimming in the Seine River
Beck competed in the women’s marathon swim on Thursday and felt unwell on Friday.
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She posted an Instagram story of herself holding a thumbs up with the captions “threw up nine times + diarrhea” and “water quality in the Seine is approved” with a green checkmark.
Belgian 1.5km star Jolien Vermeylen said earlier in August that she “felt and saw things we shouldn’t think about too much” during her swim.
“The Seine has been dirty for a hundred years, so they cannot say that the safety of the athletes is a priority. That is nonsense,” he told VTM.
There were fears that Olympic chiefs might have to cancel the swimming segment of the triathlon and turn it into a duathlon.
Triathlon training sessions on the Seine were cancelled at the end of July, leaving athletes uncertain whether the swim would take place.
Swimming in the Seine, which runs through Paris, has been banned since 1923. In 1990, Jacques Chirac, then mayor of the city, declared that he would clean it up enough to allow entry, but failed in his mission.
Meanwhile, the Paris 2024 CEO refused to apologise to competitors when asked by Mail Sport if he would do so.
“We have to wait,” said Etienne Thobois. “We don’t create fictional scenarios. We are very respectful of the athletes.”
Around £1.2bn was spent on regenerating the river, but multiple tests found it to be dirty.
A French water charity has found “alarming” levels of bacteria in all but one of 14 samples taken from the Seine in the six months to April.
“They are the heart of the Games. We have done everything possible in conjunction with the international federations and public authorities to achieve the goal of swimming in the Seine, which will be a fantastic legacy.”
Parisians had threatened to defecate in the river during preparations for the Olympics in protest at apparently ineffective spending to clean it up.
