Blaming “misogynistic perverts in sport and their boot lickers”, dual Olympic silver medallist Maddie Groves has pulled out of Australia’s swimming trials for the Tokyo Games. The 26-year-old, who came second in the 200-metre butterfly and 4×100 medley relay at the 2016 Rio Olympics, made the shock revelation ahead of the trials starting in Adelaide on Saturday. “Let this be a lesson to all misogynistic perverts in sport and their boot lickers,” she mentioned on Instagram late Thursday in explaining the transfer. “You can now not exploit younger ladies and women, physique disgrace or medically gaslight them after which anticipate them to signify you so you possibly can earn your annual bonus. Time’s UP.”
The target of her comments was not clear, but last November she complained on Twitter about “a person that works at swimming making me feel uncomfortable the way they stare at me” in her swimming costume.
She additionally wrote days later a few “creepy remark” made by an unnamed coach, who she said apologised 15 minutes later “possibly cause the team psych told him to”.
Swimming Australia president Kieren Perkins mentioned Groves had not made any official criticism, and urged her to get in contact.
“Unfortunately Maddie is definitely struggling a little bit bit for the time being it could appear, based mostly on the social media posts that she’s placing up,” he told Channel Nine television Friday.
“The reality is, that’s all we know, what’s on social media, she’s at no time contacted Swimming Australia, we haven’t been able to talk to her directly and go through her concerns to find out what’s going on.”
“I can definitely reassure her that claims like these are of the utmost significance to us, and offering a secure atmosphere for all of our individuals is totally paramount to us,” he added.
Former 1500m freestyle Olympic champion Perkins stressed the governing body could only look into the matter if a complaint was lodged.
“Unfortunately, social media posts don’t constitute any actionable claim for us. We actually need to sit down and talk to people about this,” he mentioned.
“We would love to do this and we’d like Maddie to come back and converse with us if she feels that she will be able to.”
Despite withdrawing from the trials, Groves indicated she was not calling time on her career, saying she looked forward to “racing at some other competitions later in the year”.
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