“Thinner, thinner, thinner.” That’s what Mary Cain’s male coaches demanded of her. They compelled the already-thin young woman to continue losing weight until, that is, her body withered, she broke five bones, she considered suicide, and her track career ended.
She was among the most promising American middle-distance runners at age 17, having won the World Juniors at 3,000 meters in 2014 and earned a silver medal at the NACAC Under-23 1,500-meter championship in 2016. We saw her win a 1,000-meter race at the 2014 New Balance Indoor Grand Prix in Boston.
Cain joined the Nike Oregon Project in 2012 under the direction of highly acclaimed Head Coach Alberto Salazar. You might remember Salazar’s stunning 1982 Boston Marathon victory memorialized in the 2006 book, “Duel in the Sun.” He was also quite accomplished at publicly body-shaming the then-114-pound Cain, especially cruel since there were no grounds for shaming Cain in the first place.
Salazar and Nike’s win-at-all-costs approach left many careers and lives in tatters, including Mary Cain. It’s particularly galling that Salazar and his coaches had no understanding of young women’s bodies, and seemed to care little about the subject. It seems that Salazar is all about pushing limits, be they athletic, legal, ethical, or moral. Unsurprisingly, he was banned from the sport for four years in 2019 for doping offenses.
Mary Cain started telling her story in 2019. Her courage in doing so could well spare other athletes - especially young women and their families - from the disgraced Nike-Salazar machine because, count on it, Salazar will be back. Cain delivered a 2019 New York Times video op-ed that took Salazar and company to task. Her bravery encouraged eight other Nike Oregon Project athletes to detail the abusive, toxic culture led by Salazar, his coaches, and Nike executives.
She was most recently featured in a compelling piece on HBO’s “Real Sports with Bryant Gumbel” (S27, E1). Of course, Nike is doing the corporate fan dance, announcing ineffectual investigations and ducking and dodging throughout this painful chapter.
It is still very difficult in our society for young women to speak truth to power, especially on matters of abuse and body perceptions. For Cain, however, the fight continues. And to hell with those saying that this is an old story. Tell that to Mary Cain and others so grossly mistreated by Salazar and the Nike Oregon Project.
Image courtesy of Runner’s World.