The Canadian triathlete who went viral for vomiting 10 times revealed what made him sick after he swam across the polluted Seine River at the Paris Olympics.
Tyler Mislawchuck, 29, who crossed the finish line in 9th place, says he was in the running for a medal halfway through the final leg of the race Wednesday when he began to fade.
“For me, whether I was fourth or 55th it doesn’t really matter. I tried to win a medal and I went out there and was basically in third place with the two French guys for five and a half or 6 km,” the three-time Olympian told Triathlon Magazine.
“At my last Olympics there was the injury and with all the stuff that happened there was a lot of ‘what ifs,’” said Mislawchuck, who finished 15th in both the Rio 2016 and Tokyo 2020 games.
Mislawchuk blamed the high temperatures for his mid-race puking as he lives in a much cooler climate.
“I’m just a kid from Winnipeg, well, specifically Oak Bluff, where it’s –50 (Celcius) in the winter, and I’m here at the Summer Olympics.”
The temperature is equal to –58 degrees Fahrenheit.
At the start of the race, the air temperature was measured at 78.4 Fahrenheit and was 82.04 Fahrenheit, an hour after the race ended.
“For me, I did everything I could over the last three years. I came back from an Achilles tear, concussion, crashes. You name it, I’ve had it in the last three years,” he told the outlet. “I got to the start line healthy and gave it my all, I’m proud of the effort. You want more, but that’s all I had.”
Mislawchuck says he continued to motivate himself throughout the race, reaching small milestones until he passed the finish line.
“The whole time I was telling myself 20 more seconds. From about two km in I was saying 20 more seconds for the rest of your life, and I did that until 6 km. Then I kept doing it, but I ran out of a bit of steam. Unfortunately, the race is 10 km, not 6 km, and the last four km was an eternity.”
Many blamed the water in the Seine for Mislawchuk’s upchucking as the pre-race training events and the men’s race were postponed because of high levels of E. coli bacteria found in the river.
Rain during last week’s opening ceremonies caused sewage to overflow into the water.
Officials gave the green light for the individual triathlons to be run on Wednesday, despite pre-race test readings in parts of the swim course still being above the acceptable limits.
After the races, some triathletes spoke out, detailing their disgusting experiences of racing in the Seine.
Belgium’s Jolien Vermeylen shared she felt debris in the water during the women’s triathlon, which went off hours before the men’s race.
“While swimming under the bridge, I felt and saw things that we shouldn’t think about too much,” she told Flemish TV channel VTM, according to Metro.
Vermeylen also shared she had ingested a lot of water during the swim and “it doesn’t taste like Coca-Cola or Sprite, of course.”
Dutch competitors shared similar resentments of the water, calling it “disgusting” and “dirty.”
“Swimming in the Seine was disgusting,” Rachel Klamer told RTL Nieuws. “The water was dirty, and the conditions were unfair. A lot of swimmers came out of the water behind me who are actually faster. The swimming was really a lottery.”
France’s Cassandre Beaugrand and Britain’s Alex Yee took home the gold medal in their respective races.
In preparation to hold the Olympics in Paris, officials undertook an ambitious plan, including $1.5 billion in infrastructure improvements, to clean up the long-polluted Seine.
