27-07-2005, 12:47 PM
By Ken Borland
After a difficult 10 months in which Hestrie Cloete stepped away from her glittering career, suffered a miscarriage and went through a messy divorce, the South African high jumper says life is good again.
It says much for Cloete's mental strength that she is already putting such a tumultuous period firmly behind her.
The 26-year-old Cloete is, however, not straining at the leash to return to top-level athletics. She will not defend her 2001 and 2003 World Championship titles in Helsinki next week and insists that any talk of a quick return to competitive athletics is wrong.
'I felt I'd done enough for myself and South Africa for a while'
"I retired in 2004 because I felt I'd done enough for myself and South Africa for a while," Cloete said.
"I needed to sort out my life but I'm settled now. I'm going to be married again by the end of the year and then I want to start a family," she said.
The man who has provided the settling effect is Afrikaans folk pop musician Jurie Els.
Cloete, the 2000 and 2004 Olympic silver medallist, said the prospect of going for gold again in the 2008 Games in Beijing could be the inspiration for a comeback.
She had made it clear before the Athens Olympics that she would be taking time out after the Games to have a child with her then husband, Andries.
'I wish all of them good luck'
"I still want to start a family and that means it will be another two years before I return to training. The only reason to go back to the track would be to win gold at the next Olympics," Cloete said.
Cloete, who hails from the small town of Coligny, 120kms west of Johannesburg, said she was sure the South African team would not miss her in Helsinki, where the World Championships begin on August 6.
"I just know they're going to bring back medals and I wish all of them good luck," she said.
A life of relative obscurity seems to suit Cloete. She never left the dusty railway town of Coligny for the bright city lights that her status as a double world champion and 2003 IAAF World Athlete of the Year might have demanded.
She has often been spotted, invariably casually dressed, popping into a fast-food restaurant to buy the sort of food she likes but that is frowned upon by other serious athletes.
"I am not a city girl, I am a country girl. Coligny only has yield signs and four-way stop streets, no traffic lights, and I like that. I do not like driving in big cities, but when we go to Johannesburg we always have to stop off at a McDonalds," Cloete is quoted as saying on a sponsor's website.
Cloete allegedly smokes a pack of cigarettes a day but has also cultivated a wholesome image based on her deep religious faith. The Commonwealth Games high jump champion says the shock of not making the final at the Seville World Championships in 1999, even though she was the world leader in the event that year, taught her that "If it's God's will, I will win".
The lure of Olympic gold in Beijing might just be enough to rekindle Cloete's own will to return to the highest stage.
After a difficult 10 months in which Hestrie Cloete stepped away from her glittering career, suffered a miscarriage and went through a messy divorce, the South African high jumper says life is good again.
It says much for Cloete's mental strength that she is already putting such a tumultuous period firmly behind her.
The 26-year-old Cloete is, however, not straining at the leash to return to top-level athletics. She will not defend her 2001 and 2003 World Championship titles in Helsinki next week and insists that any talk of a quick return to competitive athletics is wrong.
'I felt I'd done enough for myself and South Africa for a while'
"I retired in 2004 because I felt I'd done enough for myself and South Africa for a while," Cloete said.
"I needed to sort out my life but I'm settled now. I'm going to be married again by the end of the year and then I want to start a family," she said.
The man who has provided the settling effect is Afrikaans folk pop musician Jurie Els.
Cloete, the 2000 and 2004 Olympic silver medallist, said the prospect of going for gold again in the 2008 Games in Beijing could be the inspiration for a comeback.
She had made it clear before the Athens Olympics that she would be taking time out after the Games to have a child with her then husband, Andries.
'I wish all of them good luck'
"I still want to start a family and that means it will be another two years before I return to training. The only reason to go back to the track would be to win gold at the next Olympics," Cloete said.
Cloete, who hails from the small town of Coligny, 120kms west of Johannesburg, said she was sure the South African team would not miss her in Helsinki, where the World Championships begin on August 6.
"I just know they're going to bring back medals and I wish all of them good luck," she said.
A life of relative obscurity seems to suit Cloete. She never left the dusty railway town of Coligny for the bright city lights that her status as a double world champion and 2003 IAAF World Athlete of the Year might have demanded.
She has often been spotted, invariably casually dressed, popping into a fast-food restaurant to buy the sort of food she likes but that is frowned upon by other serious athletes.
"I am not a city girl, I am a country girl. Coligny only has yield signs and four-way stop streets, no traffic lights, and I like that. I do not like driving in big cities, but when we go to Johannesburg we always have to stop off at a McDonalds," Cloete is quoted as saying on a sponsor's website.
Cloete allegedly smokes a pack of cigarettes a day but has also cultivated a wholesome image based on her deep religious faith. The Commonwealth Games high jump champion says the shock of not making the final at the Seville World Championships in 1999, even though she was the world leader in the event that year, taught her that "If it's God's will, I will win".
The lure of Olympic gold in Beijing might just be enough to rekindle Cloete's own will to return to the highest stage.