Читать книгу Indiana University Olympians. From Leroy Samse to Lilly King онлайн

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Nathan said she came in expecting to win, did so emphatically, and earned $50,000 in prize money. World record holder Irina Belova of Russia won the silver medal with 4,691 points. Nathan was first in the 60-meter hurdles (8.26), high jump (6–1¼) and shot put (49–6½), third in the long jump (20–5¾) and second in the 800 meters (2:18.98), setting indoor personal bests in all five events.

Less than three months later, she won the heptathlon at Götzis, Austria, with 6,577 points, a career best and the world’s highest score in twenty-one months. It was a total that would have earned a bronze medal at the 1999 World Championships in Seville, Spain, but she inexplicably failed to clear a bar in the high jump at the nationals and did not qualify. It was reminiscent of the pole vault failure that kept Dan O’Brien out of the 1992 Olympic decathlon.

Finally and inevitably, in 2000, Nathan achieved her long-sought goal of making it to an Olympics. In the Olympic Trials at Sacramento, California, she won—by four points, 6,343–6,339, over Sheila Burrell—despite winning just two of seven events and turning in no personal bests. Nathan said it was as if God decided it was her time.