Zola Budd - Pieterse

Hallo zusammen,

nachdem hietr schon vor einiger Zeit - im Zusammenhang mit dem Barfußjoggen - von Zola Budd die Rede war, habe ich einmal versucht, im Netz zu recherchieren.
Ergebnis :
das eingebundene Bild, und der folgende englischsprachige Text von der Running barefoot - Site :

As a teenager, Zola Budd set world records in 2,000 and 5,000 metres, world junior records at 1,500 and 3,000 metres, and ran one mile in 4:17.55. she also won the 1985 World Cross Country Championships. She was running barefoot in each of the above performances.

The following is from Zola Budd's autobiography - "Zola" (with Hugh Eley), Partridge Press, 1989

Coming from a farming background, I saw nothing out of the ordinary in running barefoot, although it seemed to startle the rest of the athletics world. I have always enjoyed going barefoot and when I was growing up I seldom wore shoes, even when I went into town. The exceptions were when I went to school, or church or on special occasions, and it was natural when I started running that I should do it barefoot.

I received my first pair of running spikes when I was thirteen and used them in a big inter-school athletics meeting. I found them uncomfortable and after that I decided to continue running barefoot because I found it more comfortable. I felt more in touch with what was happening - I could actually feel the track - and it wasn't until the cross-country season that year that I got my first pair of proper training shoes. Before that, I was content to run in plimsolls, or 'tackies' as the South Africans call them, if I was training on hard surfaces, but as most of the work I did was on grass I would usually be back to 'normal', barefoot. -p.49

Tea-shops were to become my favourite haunts in England. I can drink tea until the cows come home and I love the atmosphere in tea-shops. On this occasion half my gear was in my car and the rest in another and I didn't have any shoes. No problem for me: I went in barefoot as I would have done in Bloemfontein, but I got some strange looks. 'Oh dear,' the people inside seemed to be saying, 'the poor child. What's she doing in here with out shoes? -p.51

The one bright spot on a day that was to shake the athletics world came when the athletes in the 3000 metres final had to show their running spikes to an official, whose task it was to see that the spikes conformed to specifications. I was barefoot, so I just picked up my feet and showed them to him, white plasters on my toes and all. The poor man nearly cracked up laughing, but what else could I have done? Everybody else had spikes and I had to show him something... - p.75

Barefoot on firm ground is one thing, running without shoes in mud quite another... Going barefoot had been a big mistake as I struggled to keep my footing on the slippery downhills and the pack was closing in. To make up for the ground I lost downhill, I accelerated on level ground; and looking back, I realise just how fit I was on that day. -p.123

In einem Zeitungsartikel fand ich desweiteren, dass Zola Budd heute in Südafrika lebt, Mutter von drei Kindern ist und ab und zu noch Marathon zum eigenen Vergnügen läuft.

Serfuß
Georg