Wednesday 24 October 2007

Like most elite athletes, Osaka 10,000m bronze medallist Kara Goucher is no stranger to adversity.  She's very familiar with the roller coaster ride most athletes must navigate. 

For Goucher that roller coaster began at a young age.  Seven days before her fourth birthday, Kara's father, Mirko Grgas was killed by a drunk driver at 6:30 a.m. on Harlem River Drive near 142nd Street in New York City. 

	Kara Goucher building her gap on Paula Radcliffe (Getty Images)

The driver of the car that killed Kara's father lost control of his vehicle, it jumped the divider and went airborne, then crashed into Grgas's car, according to a United Press International report published in the New York Times.  Grgas was an All American soccer player in college and was good enough to be drafted by St. Louis's pro soccer team, but at that time, pro soccer players of his caliber could only command a salary of $12,000, not enough for a family with three kids, so Grgas got a job with his brother's insulation business and played with teams around New York in his spare time.   After his death, Kara, her mother Patty, and sisters Kelly and Kendall moved to Duluth, Minnesota to be near Patty's parents Cal and Ola Jena Haworth because, Patty says, she knew she couldn't raise three kids on her own.