Several lives ago, I was a track & field junkie (I still watch it occasionally during whatever Olympiad cycle is current, but it ain’t the same anymore.) One of the reasons was 1992 and 1996 100m Olympic champion (and star hurdler) Gail Devers and her amazing longevity – never mind wondering how the hell she could get out of the blocks with her fingernails as long as they are. So when she gets pissed – as she did when she read GAME OF SHADOWS and discovered she was included as a possible connection to the BALCO scandal – people listen.
More to the point, as Cox News Service reports, Devers took issue with the description of her relationship with coach Remi Korchemny, who later was found guilty of distributing performance-enhancing drugs. The book says “Among his greatest Olympians was Gail Devers. … But for injuries, she would have competed in five different Summer Games.” It also said she attended Korchemny’s 70th birthday party in 2002 and “gave him a plaque that read: THE GREATEST TRACK COACH OF ALL TIME.” But Devers said she has never been coached by Korchemny, was not at the party, did not give Korchemny a plaque and did, in fact, compete in five Summer Games.
So, an error, one that the authors, Mark Fainaru-Wada and Lance Williams, are happy to correct in the paperback edition. But Devers wants more: for Gotham Books to issue a press release — in language she approves — admitting the errors, and for the press release be distributed through channels that promoted “Game of Shadows,” including Sports Illustrated. Devers also wants her attorney fees reimbursed.
Will she get it? Hard to know, but she has her reasons, and good ones. “They say it’s a non-issue,” she said. “Twenty-five years of my life is not a non-issue. [I don’t] go away quietly when they do me wrong.”