FORTY YEARS AGO TODAY: Jarmila Kratochvilova runs 1:53.28 for 800m WR in Munich

😂😂😂

That's not the thread's topic. That's your obsession, darling.

No. It just shows how utterly stupid you are. For sure everybody knew it before, but in any thread there is more evidence for it.

Whether Kratochvilova doped is the only question on this thread. Only those who know nothing of the sport don't know that.

What is monumentally stupid is to not see that forty years or "almost" forty years makes absolutely no difference to the debate here about Kratochvilova. It is as relevant as a typo. I know I can always rely on the most moronic of posters to flush themselves out on these threads. You lead the pack.

Those who know nothing of the sport say "for nearly forty years".

You are stupid.

It makes all the difference, showing that you are ignorant.

You are an insecure, narcisistic little man. It's OK 😘

It's as big a deal as a typo. But when you are as limited as you are you won't see how trivial and pedantic that is.

It's "narcissistic". You above all should know that.

Interview with JK that I haven't seen anywhere. I'm sure almost all will come away with "turtle blood" vibes, but I wouldn't blame you.

1) Coach Kváč rode his tank against the Russians

„I used to go there with my schoolmate, I knew about coach Kvač quite a bit from that scholmate because she had been doing athletics for a few years already. I knew that he was the coach at the barracks and what rank he had. But then the 1968 occpation happened and as I used to commute to Čáslav by bus, before Čáslav, those meadows were full of tanks. There were a lot of Russians and Poles, the coach did not come to the practice too much, sometimes he would come, I didn’t know that he was having some issues, that he rode out, he told me only later that he rode a tank against the Russians. He stayed with the garrison for six more months and then they threw him out of every place. I don’t know why because he always had warm feelings towards Russia. He always said how there are nice people there. He had to be deeply disappointed when the Russians occupied it here, why they had actually come. Why did they kick him out, that’s what I do not know. Out of sudden, he was unemployed, he had no job. I went to school, to the high school, I know that for some time, he would deliver bread. He who had studied in Moscow for all those years… Then he started to work in the Kosmos factory in Čáslav.“

2) Running on cinders instead of tartan helped her health

„For all my life, I trained on cinder. I have to knock on wood, it worked for me. On cinder, one doesn’t suffer that much, the momentum spreads, there are no kick backs from the tartan. I had always wondered about it but then someone explained to me: ‘You know, Jarmila, first, it was horses which raced on tartan, fast horses. But then their Achilles tendons started to get achy so tartan was sold out to athletes.’ I always recalled how the Achilles tendons suffer and how many athletes have some problems with them. This way, I was told and explained that. I think that it§s true. Because when I trained on cinders, I didn‘t have many health issues. The shoe sort of digs in the cinders and there’s no momentum reverted back to the foot. I think that practicing on cinders was good for something. And when I started at a small meeting in Slatiňany in 400 metres for the first time in my life, I won’t rather tell you the time, there was another coach from Čáslav, he coached boys. And my coach told him: ’Pepík, let me show you a new quarter-mile athlete.‘ But, I lay on the lawn and I was sick. People often get sick after having run this. It‘s the longest spring and there’s nowhere to take. And I heard them and thought: ‘Guess what, I’m not going to run this ever again.’”

3) My performance worsened with a diet, I needed eggs, sausages and meat

„Or, the coach told me: ‘You know what, we will try some diet.’ It was at that time when I did not reach those results as when I would win the national championships. ‘You have to lose weight so you will keep a food log every day.’ I wrote down everything I ate but I need to say that after a month of all sorts of suffering, I lost two kilos but my time worsened by three seconds. So the coach said: ‘This is leading to nowhere, damn it, eat what you want.’ And as I am a village girl, when uncle slaughtered pigs, my mom wouldn’t cook extra meals for me when she cooked for ten or twelve people every day. I ate what others ate. I had meat, it was the basic thing. Soups, those village style thick ones, we had them every day. Sometimes, mom made soup for me with a chunk of beef cooked in it. I would fish it out and eat it with mustard or a bit of salt. But then we had dumplings all the time and I don’t want to claim that molten lard was dripping off the plates but it’s the way it was. And paradoxically, it probably helped me. For me, it worked just fine when I made scrambled eggs, heated a big sausage and went training after such a breakfast. It didn’t cause any issue at all. What was unhealthy for others was healthy for me.”

4) Cabbage leaves for a torn muscle

We were trying all sorts of things. We would see many doctors, someone just told us: ‘Hey, this doctor is good, go to see him to Brno,’ so I went to Brno. At that time, the health supervision for the national team was not on such an advanced level as it was later on. We looked for doctors, each of us, as well as we could, often depending on hearsay – this doctor is good for some sort of thing. This one is good for Achilles’ tendons, that one is good for torn muscles. The coach told me: ‘You can’t stop, you can’t run, you can’t walk too well. We’ll be going to the weight room every day to keep the body doing at least something.’ We did all sorts of exercises in the gym, for one leg only, my arms were okay. And I still couldn’t run and the days were passing by so fast so we tried all sorts of stuff. I don’t even remember what I applied to that leg. I even listened to old women’s advice, I was told things like: ‘Put leaves from [cabbage] head on it.’ So I made a dressing of cabbage. Then someone advised black elder leaves. One tries just about anything and the days pass.”

5) The team leader told her that she would hear the anthem twice

„On Saturday, I was on the heat-up field and there was Mr. Dajbych, he was the head of the athletics representation. He came to me and asked: ‚So, how have you decided?’ Silence. It was terrible, and I was in such a state of mind that I wondered I might mess it up entirely regardless of what I say. I told him: ‘See, if you could make sure that at least once, they would play the national anthem, I might possibly go for the 800 metres.’ He grabbed my hands like this and said: ‘Jarmila, I promse to you that they will play the anthem twice.’ I became nervous again. So, I say: ‘I will run that.’ I went to the lodgings where the Czechoslovak team was staying and I got a terrible headache. I was glad that there was a doctor who did acupuncture, he stuck a needle somewhere. And said: ‘ Jarmila, look, you need to calm down. You’ve decided now and that’s it.”

6) Everyone wanted to go to the Olympics but we couldn't say it

„Nobody called, like, no-one at all, at the end, the decision was: You’re not going to the Olympics. I knew that it was the end. As I’ve said, everyone wanted to go to the Olympics but we couldn’t even say it aloud. Nobody would print it, it wouldn’t be said on TV how much we wanted to go to the Olympics, it was clear. I, as the best sportswoman of Czechoslovakia, got almost a political task to write an article to the Czechoslovak Sport magazine about how great it is that we are not going to the Olympics. That was more salt to my wounds, I kept telling myself: Whoa, so now I write something and those people who know me, who know that I want to go there and at my place, in the countryside, everyone knew that I wanted to go… I was glad that the journalist who had called me to Munich the year before and told me that Marita Koch was not going to run and that they sent a late application for me for the 800 metres, called again and told me: ‘Jarmila, I will write that article for you and you will just sign it. Nobody will know it.’ And he really loved athletics, I kept the newspaper clipping for ages. Maybe I could still find it. It gave such an impression that many people had to understand that everyone wants to go but we can’t.”

memoryofnations.eu

Jarmila Kratochvílová (1951)

Jarmila Kratochvílová was born on the 26th January of 1951 in Golčův Jeníkov. During her childhood, she had to do a lot of hard work at the family smallholding and this way, she developed extraordinary strength, stamina and d...

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Mr. Livs, showing he can't read for 71 years.

Yes, it's the question if she doped.

Yup, I'm down a rabbit hole. Google Translated from the Czech. Pronoun changes may be interpreted as ironic. TM: is the interviewer.

A friend has power and a huge family. "We already have fourteen other children from my nephews and nieces," says Jarmila Kratochvílová. In the age of covid, she wouldn't even be able to invite them all to celebrate her 70th birthday yesterday. "Hopefully we will do it in the spring, when everything will be different," he hopes.
But he can celebrate with movement. In the Čáslav park, where she ran from the age of 16. Or in Golčov Jeníkov, where he goes up the hill behind the house and goes into the fields or the forest. "When you want, you can run everywhere. And when it snows, I'll take out my cross-country skis."

TM: Do you feel: I am running, therefore I am?
I don't run that much anymore. There is always something to do in the countryside, I have enough exercise. But I go for a run myself, maybe twice a week, for a maximum of five kilometers.

TM: Even in minus ten?
I would hesitate a little. I'd probably rather go to the sauna. I have such a little one at home. I preferred to go to the bigger one in Čáslav, but now it's closed. I have a lot of friends there, we sit and talk, no one's phone rings and I always learn something.

TM: You spent 54 of your 70 years in athletics. Does it seem unreal to you?
I first came to the stadium in Čáslav in the spring of 1967. I never thought I would stay here for so long.

TM: You came from a non-sporting family.
Yes, but Jeníkov is a small town where we had nothing, just flying down the street or on a frozen pond in winter. The streets and nature were my great gymnasium.

TM: Who lured you into athletics from there?
Three people. The teacher at the elementary school told me: You are smart, so when you go to Čáslav to grammar school, you should join the athletics team. A classmate from high school then convinced me: Look, I've been doing athletics for four years and you'll outrun me in gym, so come to the section with me. After a year of persuasion, I listened to her. And I met coach Kváč at the stadium.

TM: His training was said to be extreme. For example, twenty three hundreds in a row.
He was a soldier coach, he managed everything in a military manner. As soon as I was delayed for five minutes, he immediately started talking. But we worked our way through the hard training sessions for a long time. Today, the younger ones would prefer to win right away. Anyway, Mr. Kváč knew how to coax me and gradually increased my doses.

TM: As a trainer, did you later transfer his methods to your students?
No. Even though I led excellent girls, Lída Formanová and Hanka Benešová, I didn't even take out my training diaries. Every organism is different, training cannot be copied. I took a slightly different method with the girls back then. And as for the current generation, it is completely different.

TM: Where? Doesn't he have enough willpower?
Children don't fly outside that much, they don't climb trees or over fences, and therefore they are not as well prepared for sports. In addition, I also perceive their eternal distraction so that they don't miss something on their mobile phone during training.

TM: How do you convince them?
I don't have much strength to tell them how I used to go jogging on the road at four in the morning. I don't know if they could even imagine it.

TM: How many wards do you have?
Just a small group. When they all get together, there are eight of them. And someone always leaves. They graduate, there are no other schools in Čáslav, so they head elsewhere.

TM: In the time of the coronavirus, you have to improvise a lot with them, right?
We still don't even know what races will actually take place. The gym is closed. But we can go to the stadium at any time and to the park too. He has to strengthen at home. We'll adapt.

TM: You also improvised many times when you stayed at home in the winter while others flew to warm camps in the Canaries.
Just. After all, you can train anywhere. Even on manure, as my coach said.

TM: In your case, especially on the Čáslav cinders, right?
Thanks God. Maybe that's why I stayed healthy for so long.

TM: Because of the cinder block?
Yeah. Although we were dirty from her and she bloated in the winter, she was not bad from a health point of view. Today's fast artificial surfaces cause big impacts to the muscles. But it's easier to shovel snow from them.

TM: Is it still true that you have no major health problems after your career?
It applies. The body holds. Although many who watched my hard workouts warned me that I would have health problems later because of them.

TM: You would also frighten today's nutritionists with your dietary preferences.
You know, steaks or sausages also worked for me in the preparation. I still like them, I don't care about today's food fashion. Let everyone find what makes them feel good.

TM: Lada Vondrová, a talent with an admirable range from one hundred to eight, sometimes comes to Čáslav to train. Does it remind you of your old frenetic racing combos?
Probably yes. Lada is a hardworking girl. And very young. It took many years for me to make three starts in one afternoon like her. However, her coach knows her and believes that she is already capable of this.

TM: It probably also brings back memories of your legendary 400m and 800m gold medal at the World Championships in Helsinki in 1983, doesn't it?
Of course, I remember this often. I was originally supposed to run there only Thursday, until my world record for 800 meters from Munich 1983 just before the championship changed everything. And I managed it. You know, I trained really hard back then. I wanted so badly to beat Marita Kochová so that I wouldn't always be listening to the GDR anthem on the podium.

TM: You said goodbye to your career in 1987 by sending out telegrams announcing the end of your racing activities. The evening after, you were said to be all white.
Yeah, I was sick. You can't prepare for such a moment, even though I originally wanted to finish at the Olympics in Los Angeles in 1984. But when they didn't let us go there, I extended my career for another three years. Which I definitely did not regret.

TM: You have held the world record for 800 meters for 37 years. What is it to you?
If I lost him, I would probably regret it for a while. But I understand that for others, on the contrary, it is a great motivation to overcome him. Although who knows, athletes today have quite different motivations.

TM: What kind?
They can earn a bundle of money in so many rallies. That's why maybe the world record doesn't bother them too much.

TM: Take a guess. How long could he stay with you?
I don't know. If Caster Semenya could keep running, she would have one by now. I watched her every race, how she wasn't even very tired after the finish, and I thought: It won't be a problem for her. I don't know what will happen to her now.

TM: Should she continue to race among women?
That has to be solved by other people. She is not responsible for her problem (according to the new rules, Semenya should take medication to reduce her excessively high testosterone level), she was already born that way. But on the other hand, I also understand the other girls that they didn't want to run with her.

TM: How have you heard the suggestions that records from the 1980s, including yours, be annulled?
Every time I read about it, I thought: What kind of nonsense is this, after all, it's not possible for them to say smidgen from today, we're canceling them. Even then, I would still feel in my soul and heart that I have the world record.

TM: That time is criticized because of the doping practices of that time revealed not only in athletics. You have stated many times that you have never doped in your life. Are you bothered by the endless hints?
I learned to live with them a long time ago. Let everyone say what they want. Only me and the coach know the path we took and the training that led me to my results. Whoever writes about doping has never seen my training sessions. I have a clear conscience. Unfortunately, this is such a characteristic of ours, not only in sports, that when someone is good at something, they are immediately suspect.

TM: There was also speculation about Usain Bolt, whether he was helping himself with prohibited means.
And he was exceptional. From time to time such a person is born who is capable of performing amazing feats. However, you also need a lot of other things for them, not just talent. Also health, love of sport, background, incredible diligence and humility. Mainly the humility, I emphasize that.

TM: Would you say that athletics has become your lifelong love?
Probably yes. I'm glad that I experienced all this, although sometimes I cried and didn't even want to come to training the next day. It belongs to it.

TM: The pain.
And a long road to success. I remember this fondly. With it, you will experience everything, including a lot of problems. How you deal with them is up to you.

TM: What else do you do these days when you're not doing athletics?
In the summer I am in the garden, growing flowers and vegetables. And above all, we like to be together with our family when there are so many of us. I'm definitely not lying on the couch. Besides athletics, I really like watching biathlon. I also went to Nové Mesto to cheer several times and I had a lot of fun. I enjoy every transmission. I go to them like I go to the theater.

TM: Say, do you feel 70 years old?
Seventy is just a number after all. Nothing changes with her in my life. I don't really care about her either.

TM: What are you dreaming about now?
That I will be at training again in the afternoon. That I can handle everything around my birthday, because just during our conversation, maybe a hundred people have called me now. And then I dream that there really will be an Olympics in Tokyo this summer.

TM: And you will get up in the middle of the night to broadcast?
Certainly. I stood up for them at every Olympics, I won't break that.
You need more than just talent to perform amazingly. Also health, love of sport, background, incredible diligence and humility - I emphasize here.

The rabbit hole is deep, and my willing suspension of disbelief is at an all time high for this woman.

Jaroslav Pesta editor
26/07/2023 00:00 ▪ 7 min. reading

Exactly 40 years ago - on July 26, 1983 - Jarmila Kratochvílová achieved the oldest outdoor athletics world record in the 800 meters with a time of 1:53.28. In addition, she became a two-time world champion, ran for a silver medal at the Olympic Games, held the indoor world record for 400 meters for almost 41 years, and four times found her way to the first place at the European indoor championships. "The road to the top was long, full of demanding training and sacrifices. My advantage was the excellent physical foundation I gained from working in the fields. I was always outside, in the snow, in the rain, in the dust," says the 72-year-old former athlete and also a long-time successful coach in an interview for HN.

Did you want to try to break the world record at the meeting in Munich?
No way, I just wanted to confirm my form before the World Championships in Helsinki, because a few days ago in Prague I ran the second best time in the world in the 400 meters race. In Munich, I decided to go for the eight, but with no enormous effort to achieve some extraordinary time. I ran with a clear head, I didn't know split times.
I don't understand how it turned out so wonderfully.

Already in 1982, you set the indoor world record in the 400 meters with a time of 49.59, which lasted until this February, when the Dutchwoman Femke Bolová beat it by 33 hundredths of a second. Was it a big disappointment for you?
I wasn't sad because this record was never very important to me, nobody reminded me of it in my life. But it's nice that it lasted so long, almost 41 years, and it was created by a European woman.
Bolová is an exceptional person, which she confirmed already at the age of 21 with the Olympic bronze from Tokyo.

You have a rich medal collection and a long line of winning international races. How difficult was the road to top performance?
The teacher Zdeněk Sychrovský has the greatest credit for my first steps, who founded an athletics club at the primary school in Golčov Jeníková and more than once advised me to start devoting myself to the queen of sports. At the gymnasium in Čáslav, I went to the playground with a friend, I liked being in a great group, I was attracted to athletics and gradually improved under the guidance of coach Miroslav Kváč. The road to the top was long, full of demanding training and sacrifices. My advantage was an excellent physical foundation, which I gained by working in the fields. I was always outside, in the snow, in the rain, in the dust.

For your first medal on the international stage, you finished second in the 400-meter race in 1979 at the European Indoor Championships in Vienna. What was its value to you?
A huge one, and I was only a hundredth of a second away from the gold metal. This success was a great motivation for me before the Olympics in 1980.

What ideas did you have when you went to Moscow?
My unequivocal goal was to advance to the finals in the 400 meters, and the preparation corresponded to that. I had an alarm at four o'clock so that after training I could be at the textile factory where I worked as an accountant at six o'clock. It was very challenging for me, but I was very happy with the reward in the form of an unexpected silver medal.

For the next two years, you took first or second place in all races. What was most valuable to you?
Above all, I was in excellent health, physically I was perfectly prepared. For example, after three hours of work in the field, I went racing without any problems. My great love for athletics remained undiminished. Even after the hard training, I still added something. And at the World Cup in Rome, I managed to beat the great German Kochová for the first time in the 400 meters. And I missed the world record by two hundredths of a second.

In 1983, after the already mentioned world record in the octagon, the first ever World Athletics Championships took place, where you ran for two gold medals. How did you achieve this triumph?
My quarter and half starts were quite a risk because the 800m final was only half an hour after the 400m semi-final. I had a headache, I had no idea what was waiting for me, I didn't even know that I had only one shoe on. But everything turned out great in the end. At the halfway mark, I was ahead of the leading pair of Russian women until the last 200 meters, and even though the fourth was not easy, I also managed it, even in a world record of 47.99. I also helped the relay team win silver and I had wonderful moments on the podium to the sounds of the national anthem.

In the World Cup in England, you also beat Kochová in the 200 meters. What was the race like?
Points were needed for a bronze medal at this team "world championship", so after winning the 800 meters I also went to the start of the 200 meters. It was a championship track for Koch at her insane speed. However, my attempt to defeat her was successful. Although we both achieved the same time of 22.40, a few thousandths of a second decided in my favor.

The countries of the socialist camp did not participate in the 1984 Olympic Games in Los Angeles for political reasons. Was it very painful?
It hurt a lot. Originally, I wanted to end my sports career there, because I was going to have an achilles operation. I did not return to the track until 17 months later and my wish was to say goodbye at some top event, which happened in 1987 at the World Championships in Rome. I finished fifth in the 800 meter race in great competition.

However, you stayed with athletics as a coach. What is youth work like today?
Pretty complicated. There is a lack of appetite and a greater will for demanding preparation, and at the same time it is not possible without hard work. Young people today have a much richer daily schedule, their own computers and mobile phones, which they turn on even during breaks during training. They are not used to working hard. Some don't come to training and maybe even to races because it's either too hot, or cold, or raining. They are always in a hurry. At the same time, there are promising boys and girls among the teenagers and juniors, but they lack the love for athletics. They would like performances, but they don't enjoy it. I enjoyed athletics, and I also had the support of my family. In recent years, sometimes I would like to leave this job, but then a talented girl appears and I return again to try to help her.

How often and to what extent do you devote yourself to your coaching activities at the age of 72?
Almost every day for 56 years, I have been driving 15 kilometers from my hometown of Golčov Jeníkov to the stadium in Čáslav, where I mainly try to pass on at least some of my rich experience to my clients. My charges usually include five to six girls aged 12-25. Otherwise, I literally dread every matriculation exam, because then many of them leave Čáslav to study at some university and end up with athletics.

Compared to your time, what role does money play today?
Incomparable! For example, for the aforementioned world record from Munich, I received 3,000 crowns as a reward, which was not even for the TV I wanted to buy. Today, the amount of the entry fee is the center of attention at foreign meetings.

Which of the awards you have won has the most value for you?
It is a 1st degree Merit Medal that I received ten years ago from the then President Miloš Zeman.

And how do you experience the races today, in which your amazing world record is threatened?
In front of the TV with a stopwatch in hand (laughs). The Cuban Jelimová wanted to surpass him, and above all the South African Semenyaová during the constant solution to her problem with a higher level of testosterone . After her always faster first round, I'm always quite stressed and get up from my chair. When my nephew watches with me, he reassures me that the last hundred is still to come. I am glad that this record has remained in the Czech Republic for so long.

archiv.hn.cz

Z?vody, ve kter?ch je ohro?en? m?j sv?tov? rekord, sleduji se stopkami v ruce, ??k? Kratochv?lov?

Jaroslav Pe?ta

P?esn? p?ed 40 lety – 26. ?ervence 1983 – dos?hla Jarmila Kratochv?lov? nejstar??ho atletick?ho sv?tov?ho rekordu pod ?ir?m nebem v b?hu na 800 metr? ?asem 1:53,28. Nav?c se stala dvojn?sobnou mistryn? sv?ta, dob?hla si pro s...

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Kratochvílová: Nowadays, I wouldn't run the record
Jul 26, 2008 10:15 am

She is a modest, ordinary woman. In the best sense of the word. This is how you feel about Jarmila Kratochvílova, the legend of Czech athletics. She came to Pilsen at the invitation of Vlastimil Šroubek, the organizer of running meetings. He handed her a cake with two numbers - 25 and 1:53.28.

Today, she is celebrating the incredible twenty-fifth anniversary of her current oldest athletics world record. The one in the eight, which she ran completely unexpectedly at the meeting in Munich in 1983, shortly before the double gold world championship in Helsinki. You wouldn't guess fifty-seven years old for a slender and well-groomed lady.
He speaks quietly and deliberately, and when he names, for example, his biggest rival Marita Kochová, he immediately explains who she actually was. It's as if she thinks that the time when she collected her greatest achievements is long forgotten.

What is Jarmila Kratochvílov doing today, twenty-five years after breaking the world record?
I train a group of runners at home in Čáslav. We were just at training.

Do you have a significant talent in the group?
Yes. There is a girl there, second in the national championship this year, but she is leaving Čáslav to attend university in Prague, and I think she will finish.

Why?
I'd say he won't last in athletics. He is not the type for whom sport comes first. This is necessary for great success. Sometimes a very clever person appears in a group like this, but we live in difficult times.

Does time not favor athletics?
When I trained, for example, Lída Formanová, it was even different. Nowadays, young people don't enjoy athletics and sports very much, it's hard work. They have other interests.

So do you make a living as a coach in the Čáslav team?
I don't make a living, I do it for free. There is little money in the department, so we don't even have coaches who would devote themselves to disciplines other than running.

You train for free. What do you live on?
I am still employed as a trainer at USK Prague until September. Because Lída Formanová raced for them, I had a contract. But Lída has finished, from September she is going to teach physical education at the gymnasium in Čáslav, and my contract is ending. I don't know what I'll do next. I don't want to go to practice in Prague. I would like to train at home in Čáslav, but without a crown, just for the love of athletics and the memories of stepping into the stadium there forty years ago, that's not possible either. So for now I'm researching, but I'm not really solving it. I don't want to spoil the Olympics.

Will you fly to Beijing to see?
No, no, that's too expensive. If the Czech Athletics Association or the Olympic Committee had invited me, I would have liked it, but that didn't happen. In addition, I think that when I see it repeated on TV maybe ten times, that it is very instructive for me as a coach. But I would still like to experience the atmosphere of the Olympics, it is wonderful. I was with the girls (Hana Benešová and Lída Formanová, author's note) for the last time in 2000 in Sydney.

Let's reminisce a bit. What comes to mind when you hear the year 1983?
(comes to life) Definitely the most successful year of his entire career. Two world records, three World Championship medals. And at the end, like a candy, Order of work (smile). I would never return it, because I really like it for work.

It hurt you a lot that a year later the socialist bloc boycotted the Olympics in Los Angeles, didn't it?
Certainly. As soon as the World Championships in Helsinki ended, preparations for the Olympics began. In the end, we couldn't do it, so the joy of success was quickly replaced by disappointment.

In the successful year of 1983, you set an incredible world record for 800 meters. The time of 1:53.28 rules the charts to this day and is the oldest athletic record ever. It's twenty-five years today. Do you remember it more often on an anniversary?
I'll probably remember it more than once. Even journalists ask me about it. I regularly watch the Golden League meetings on TV, where this year the women's 800-meter run is included as the main discipline, and an 18-year-old Kenyan runs there, and she already ran under 1:55 (Pamela Jelimová 1:54.97, author's note). I can also hear the commentators saying: She is already running faster than Jarmila Kratochvílová. She always runs faster in the 600, but in the end it's not enough. And this year, Russia also ran excellently (Jelena Sobolevová 1:54.85, which is the fastest time in the last 11 years, auto note). I would trust her more because she is more experienced. This year, however, the world record will still stand. 1.5 seconds is nothing in life. But it's too much on the athletics track.

What all has to come together for a competitor to even come close to your time, or even beat it?
First of all, a lot of work. Second, health. And perhaps even more is the third, which is the love of athletics. This includes rejoicing, but also crying, because the preparation hurts. The people around are also important. A coach and loved ones who will support you.
When you ran the record time in Munich, did you have any idea that it could last so long?
Absolutely no. Although then, when more meetings were added and athletics went in a different direction, I began to suspect that it would last a long time. After all, girls are not machines, so now that they complete a lot of races that attract jackpots or gold bars, they don't have as much time to train. We ran a race and then nothing for three months. The question is, if I ran at this time, would I run the record? And I think not.

When you remember your most famous years, do you remember more the joy of winning and records, or the hard work you had to undergo?
I liked hard work. I was often happier after a big training session than after a race. I always thought that the fastest runner in the world was Kochová, a competitor from the GDR, who held world records on the 400-meter track, that is, on my main track, and I wanted to get close to her. And when I trained, I thought: What if Marita ran three more sections in Rostock today? So I added them even though I couldn't at all. On to that question. After all, you'll cross the finish line and that's a blink of an eye. If you could stop it and enjoy it more, you can't. Then the victory is connected with the press, doping check, podium and the end.
Legends were told about the methods of coach Kváč. Could they even be used nowadays?
I used a little something to train with Lída Formanová, she was a two-time world champion, and you can't do that without work. But for many years I didn't open my diaries at all so as not to scare her. In addition, Lída was more prone to health problems than I was. So something can definitely be used. Even years later, I admit that I had a hard time with Mr. Kváč. Sometimes I felt sorry that he was just holding the stopwatch and demanding such things from me. But I note that if I didn't want to do it, I wouldn't have done it. If you want to be world class, you have to work hard.

What is movement for you today?
I'm always at the stadium. I cross-country ski in the winter. And my sisters tell me: We are not going anywhere with you, you are not walking, but running. I simply cannot be without movement.

Can you imagine life without athletics?
I can't. But one day I will have to quit athletics. And maybe it won't take long.

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Je to skromná, obyčejná ženská. V tom nejlepším slova smyslu. Takový máte pocit z Jarmily Kratochvílové, legendy české atletiky. Do Plzně přijela na pozvání Vlastimila Šroubka, organizátora běžeckých mítinků. Ten jí předal do...

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Seems to be a totally down to earth, quit and honest person.

There is no doubt she doped. A forty year old world record that still stands in a doped sport. Case closed.

Is Femke a doper?

Wrong question. Is anyone a doper?

No. It's the question I asked you. Is Femke doping?