Sunday, February 17, 2002
A hero wants his moment
By STEVE SIMMONS -- Team Sun
SALT LAKE CITY -- The first athlete to march into the Olympic Games fully expects to finish last, but that isn't why Michael Panagiotis Voudouris is here.
All he wants at the Winter Olympics is a moment to remember, to remind the world, a moment he hopes won't be stolen away from him.
This morning when the new Olympic sport of skeleton officially begins, the sled that is owned by Voudouris will be inspected by members of the International Olympic Committee. Inspected like all the other sleds, only his is different.
His is a sled with the number 30 painted on it -- representing the number of Greeks who died in the tragedy of Sept. 11 -- and with a drawing of the World Trade Center and the names inscribed of the nine emergency medical technicians who lost their lives trying to save others.
When not sliding down hills head first, representing Greece, Michael Voudouris -- born to Greek immigrants, a native of Queen's, New York -- happens to be an emergency medical technician.
A medical technician who set up a triage centre one block from Ground Zero and worked 40 consecutive hours twice without sleep after Sept. 11. All Voudouris is hoping for today is clearance from the IOC to use his sled in all its memorial decoration at a time when the IOC has a policy against any athlete making any kind of political statement.
NOT POLITICAL
"It's not about politics ... it's about remembering and paying tribute," said Voudouris, who is 40 years young. "You only hear about the firemen and the policemen who lost their lives as heroes, heroes meaning people who assumed risk when putting on their badge and ended up losing their lives.
"This just gives me an opportunity to explain it wasn't only police and firemen who were there, who lost their lives. It was my friends, it was people I worked with."
When the Olympics began one week and two figure skating controversies ago, there was much debate over whether to include the flag of the World Trade Center in the opening ceremony. And after flip-flopping on the subject, the IOC reluctantly agreed to allow eight Americans, many with fascinating stories themselves, to carry the flag into the Olympic Stadium.
But no one asked Voudouris -- American born, a man with two passports, the only athlete here who worked at Ground Zero -- to be part of the ceremony. No one asked this hero without a medal.
"They certainly knew about me," he said of the United States Olympic Committee.
"They picked their own guys."
Hopefully today, in a new enlightened IOC world, the men who will inspect Voudouris' sled will have the sense to take a look, shake his hand, and welcome him to the Olympics. Hopefully they won't ask him to paint over his personal memorial, his opportunity to tell his story one more time.
But he isn't so certain.
"If they say no, I will not fight them on this," he said. "I will cover it up or take it off. I'm not here to embarrass anyone, especially Greece."
Yesterday, he already was hearing whispers his sled would not be approved and was making plans just in case. He found another sled, used by an American who didn't qualify. He doesn't want to change the sled and all it means to him. If it comes to this, he'd rather switch than fight.
"I'm not embarrassed to finish last," he said. "I understand that's a possibility. Where I place doesn't matter. I can't tell you why I do this, but I just know it's something I have to do."
This is Michael Voudouris' third Olympic Games, his first as an athlete. The first two times he was working as a photographer, his freelance business. This time he got here the hard way.
After Sept. 11, when training for most Olympians intensified, Voudouris found himself most unhealthy. First physically, then depressed, then suffering from insomnia. Two months of training somehow disappeared. And when others were flying around the world to prepare, when he finally felt ready and able to get back to work and back to training, he got into his car, had the sled fastened to the roof, and drove from New York to Calgary.
He couldn't afford regular training time, let alone the cost of flights. He has no coach, almost no funding and in this event, no real chance.
Except to tell his story and show his sled.
"I'm not like Eddie the Eagle," he said. "This is no joke. I can still smell that burnt skin like it was yesterday. This is something that will be with me forever. People still need to know that."
2002 Games Columnists
