Thursday,
May 10, 2007
Laure Manaudou,
20, French Swim Star Elopes w Italian Boyfriend, Luca Marin.-To Swim for
The
ANNOTICO Report
Laure's move provoked fury in
This
is a Soap Opera !!!!!!!! Read about
the various ramifications. It gets complicated!
Manaudou, who holds three world
records, announced that she had quit her club in Canet,
southern France, for "the love of my life".
"I am
choosing l'amour," said the 20-year-old, who is
carrying French hopes for the Beijing Olympics next year after winning gold,
silver and bronze at the Athens Games in 2004 and a swag of medals in
"I want to
live with him and have a child with him."
At a press
conference yesterday, Manaudou said she would train
at LaPress swimming club in Turin, which is reported
to have offered her a contract worth E400,000 ($654,000) a year.
As her move
provoked fury in
French officials
believe the Italians will push Manaudou into a
marriage with Marin so she acquires Italian nationality and can swim for
For that reason
they have been pressuring her to return. Jean-Francois Lamour,
the French Sports Minister, said: "It would be good if she realised that in the interests of sport she should stay in Canet."
The French
authorities have also been seeking to influence the Italian Swimming
Federation, whose president, Paolo Barelli, was
phoned by
"You should
not take decisions with youthful impetuosity which you realise
afterwards were not thought through," Barelli
said.
"Manaudou's love is very embarrassing for
However, that comment sparked further ire in
Amid the furore, Manaudou was adamant that
she would not abandon her French passport, saying: "I'm going to swim for
Despite the
qualms of the Italian federation, which has no desire to cross swords with its
French counterpart, LaPress is determined to attract
the swimmer.
The club managers
believe the financial rewards will be significant, given Manaudou's
earning power.
This was
illustrated when she obtained a E1million-a-year
contract to carry out modelling work for the French
billionaire Francois Pinault, the owner of Gucci.
But as often in
love affairs, there is a jilted party - in this case Manaudou's
tough French coach, Philippe Lucas, whose training
program includes making her swim up to 17km a day.
"I'm not
sad," Lucas said yesterday. "There's no problem."
However, he told
reporters that Manaudou had failed to train for the
past five weeks and would need to put in extra work over the next four months
to be a chance in
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