Olympic diving: Despatie almost skipped Games
Posted By François Foisy, Journal de Montréal
Posted 19 hours ago
Despatie had been B.C. massage therapist Jennifer Pendray’s most regular patient since his arrival in China.
BEIJING – A few days before he took Olympic silver, Alexandre Despatie wasn’t sure he’d be competing in the Games at all.
At the time, the Canadian diving team was holed up in Xian for some pre-Olympic training, far from the noise and chaos of the Chinese capital.
Coming out of a seven week hiatus thanks to a broken bone in his foot, Despatie was playing catch-up. The heavily favoured Chinese were eyeing up the gold and silver spots on the springboard and were in serious need of a run for their money.
That was when an old enemy, back spasms, came back to haunt the Quebec swimmer.
“I haven’t spoken about it, but I had a hard time when I arrived here in China,” Despatie said yesterday, 12 hours after winning a silver medal performance at Beijing’s Water Cube, his second in as many Olympics.
“It scared me but I managed to control it and deliver a good performance. I’ll have to keep an eye on it in the upcoming season.”
It’s easy to see from the way he talks about the days leading up to the final that Despatie feared the worst.
“I was afraid because at the start of training camp, there were days when it hurt so much that I couldn’t train,” he remembered.
“I didn’t want to have done all this work only to have another injury stop me from diving in the end.”
“It worried him a lot,” his mom, Christiane, said yesterday morning. “It was at the point where he phoned up one day and said, ‘Mom, if I don’t get a cortisone injection, I won’t be able to compete.’”
After taking the silver medal, Despatie made sure to thank everyone who helped him along the way, including the medical team. Despatie had been B.C. massage therapist Jennifer Pendray’s most regular patient since his arrival in China.
“In an environment like the Games, an injury leads to a lot of anxiety,” she explained. “The athlete doesn’t know if they’ll be able train at such a high level or if the injury will affect them in competition. Both the injury and the stress have to be managed.”
But did Despatie almost not make it to his Olympic event?
“I was never worried he wouldn’t be able to compete,” said Pendray. “Like I said, in the Olympics, anxiety becomes a problem because the athlete is up against the unknown. That can add to the pain.”
According to the Despatie’s parents, when it comes to her patients, Pendray’s commitment goes all the way to the podium.
“She was checking up on him once a day, twice a day during the last month,” his father, Pierre Despatie, said, obviously grateful for the care his son received from Pendray and the other team specialists.
“Jennifer did an incredible job,” said Christiane Despatie. “She was crying so much yesterday (the night of the medal). It was definitely stressful. Just like Alexandre, she also had a job to do.”
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