The Secret Olympian: The Inside Story of the Olympic Experience

Olympic athletes are tightly controlled by their national associations and individuals often have sponsorship agreements that prohibit them from discussing anything controversial about the Games…until now. Anonymous interviews with athletes from the Munich Games of 1960 to the present reveal the true inside story of what the Olympic experience is really like. Their stories include post-competition wild debauchery from excessive drinking to over-the-top practical jokes to competition for the most number of hook-ups and even encounters with politicians’ flirty spouses. Olympic-level athletes also reveal their freaky physiological regimes, odd genetic abnormalities and how the pressure-cooker of the Games can lead to resentment and fighting in the Olympic Village and some unusual coping techniques to stay focused on the competition. From the opening kitting ceremony where athletes are given up to 80 pounds of official team clothing to the shocking shifts from a lifetime of training in solitude to the glaring spotlight of the world stage to post-Games fame or obscurity, these are fascinating never-before-told tales of what happens when the world’s exclusive super athletes convene at the premier sporting event every four years in their quest for glory.