Olympic Runner Kara Goucher on Sex Abuse Allegations Against Coach: 'I Want My Voice to Be Heard'

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Kara Goucher's Olympic dreams began the moment she saw American bronze medalist Lynn Jennings and other distance runners rocketing through the punishingly long 10,000-meter race in Barcelona in 1992.

Introduced to the sport by her grandfather, the late Calvin Haworth, who took her to her first "fun run" at 6, Goucher, then 14, had already scored her own medals in school track meets.

But she had never seen anything like the 10,000-meter, a 6.2-mile race that's the longest track event at the Olympics.

Sitting wide-eyed on the couch that day watching the Summer Games with her family, the soon-to-be high school freshman vowed to one day make it to the Olympics herself.

"I mean, I was a kid who literally listened to the Olympic theme music while I did my homework, even in high school," Goucher, now 44, tells PEOPLE.

Goucher would go on to become one of the fastest distance runners in U.S. history, winning countless races including a silver medal at the 2007 World Championships in the 10,000 meters in Osaka, Japan; making it to the podium in the New York City and Boston marathons, and yes, competing in the 2008 and 2012 Olympics.

RELATED: Olympian Kara Goucher Publishes Daring New Memoir, Detailing Sexual Abuse at the Hands of Her Coach

Michelle V. Agins

As a member of the Nike Oregon Project, an exclusive running team coached by world-famous marathon runner Alberto Salazar at the company's Portland, Ore., campus, she even became the face of Nike for a time.

Her victories came with plenty of hard work and sacrifice — and a deep pain she hid from the world for years, until now.

In her explosive new memoir, The Longest Race: Inside the Secret World of Abuse, Doping, and Deception on Nike's Elite Running Team, the celebrated athlete opens up publicly for the first time about the abuse she says she suffered at the hands of Salazar, who coached her at the Oregon Project.

In July 2021, the U.S. Center for SafeSport banned Salazar for life from track and field for sexual and emotional misconduct.

Kara Goucher's memoir debuted March 14, 2023

Salazar appealed the decision and lost. During a Dec. 2021 hearing, an arbitrator ruled it was "more likely than not" that Salazar had digitally penetrated one of his runners during two sports massages, The New York Times reports. (He denied the allegations in an email to the Times in Jan. 2022, and did so again in a statement to Good Morning America on Tuesday. He did not respond to requests for comment from PEOPLE.)

For the first time ever, Goucher alleges publicly in the memoir that she was the previously unnamed victim of that sexual abuse.

"I was tired of other people talking about me and my voice not being heard," she says about why she found the courage to come forward with her story. "I felt like this is the time."

"I want to tell my side of the story where no one can interrupt me or talk down to me or try to twist what I am saying," she says. "I want to set the record straight."

Even so, she admits she was reluctant to publicly share her long held secret about the storied coach she once considered a father figure.

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"I spent so much time worrying about him and his family and how it would affect them," says Goucher, who joined the Oregon Project in 2004 with her husband, noted distance runner and fellow Olympian Adam Goucher.

But as time went on, she realized how negatively this secret was affecting her and her family.

"I'm not the one that did something wrong," she says. "But I realized that keeping those secrets was almost like a cancer in me. And I just felt like I didn't deserve to live like that anymore."

Doping Allegations Against Salazar

Debuting March 14, the memoir also details how Goucher and her husband were among those who helped blow the whistle on Salazar for pushing the limits of anti-doping rules with what she describes as his cult-like team.

In 2019, Salazar was suspended for four years from track and field by the U.S. Anti-Doping Agency for offenses including trafficking testosterone.

Salazar has denied doping and abuse claims, both in legal proceedings and in a lengthy blog post.

Salazar did not respond to PEOPLE's requests for comment.

In an email to PEOPLE, a spokesperson for Nike wrote, "Sexual misconduct has no place in sports or society and is something we stand vehemently against. As a company, we've always taken great pride as a leader in supporting female athletes. We know that Nike can continue to play an elevated role in supporting female athletes and improving their experience in sports.

"Alberto is no longer a contracted coach, and we shuttered the Oregon project several years ago. In July 2021, we were informed of a preliminary decision from the U.S. Center for SafeSport to ban Mr. Salazar from coaching for "Sexual Misconduct & Emotional Misconduct." Following SafeSport's decision, we changed the Alberto Salazar building name at our World Headquarters to Next%."

Nike, the statement continued, "does not condone the use of banned substances in any manner. The doping allegations have been extensively investigated and arbitrated. In 2021 a Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS) panel reaffirmed that Mr. Salazar did not engage in any doping of his athletes and not a single Oregon Project athlete was found to have violated the rules."

Written with New York Times bestselling author Mary Pilon, the page-turner from Simon & Schuster's Gallery Books details Goucher's rise to prominence in the running world, from becoming a three-time NCAA champion to giving readers an inside look at what it was like to be at the Olympics.

Goucher talks about how she met Adam, how they dated when they were at the University of Colorado at Boulder and how the two navigated the Oregon Project together.

She details how she found the courage to break free of Salazar's dysfunctional grip and expose the truth about his unorthodox coaching methods.

Goucher left the Oregon Project in 2011 after she gave birth to son Colt, now 12, who, like his parents, is a runner.

Today, Goucher works as an on-air running analyst for NBC Sports and cohosts the hit running commentary podcast Nobody Asked Us with Des & Kara, as well as the Clean Sport Collective podcast, promoting fair play in sports. Besides that, she is an athlete/advisor at Oiselle, which is sponsored by Altra Running, and is a content provider for Patreon.com/Relay.

She hopes her story will help other women. "I hope it opens up a lot of conversations," she says.

"There are a lot of women who have experienced similar situations, and I hope it lets them know that they're not alone. They shouldn't be ashamed."

"I hope for my own personal sport of track and field, that it really leads into change. There should be something in place at every level where you can talk to someone about this stuff, where you can talk if you feel uncomfortable by your coach or experience something. None of that was there."

Protecting others was important to her.

"I couldn't take knowing that I could have protected someone and I didn't," she says.

Asked if she feels brave for coming forward, she says, "I don't feel brave. I just feel like I would be a bad person if I didn't do this."

The Longest Race: Inside the Secret World of Abuse, Doping, and Deception on Nike's Elite Running Team is available at bookstores now.

In exclusive excerpts, Kara Goucher details the abuse and her confusion, horror and anguish in its aftermath:

During a massage, Goucher says her coach Alberto Salazar inserted his finger into her vagina.

There is fight. There is flight. There is also another reaction people sometimes forget: freeze. I lay there, completely stunned. My mind raced, but my body couldn't move. Part of me expected a joke or comment of some sort about where his hand had gone. Maybe an apology. But he just continued on with the massage as normal. He massaged my glutes, then untucked my shorts. His actions and demeanor were as if nothing out of the ordinary had occurred. "Goodbye," he said, wrapping up the massage. "I'll see you tomorrow." Then he just walked out of the room. I stayed motionless, for how long I do not know. What just happened? my mind demanded. Did he really do that? What do I tell Adam?

Things got inappropriate on a plane ride.

He told an unsettling story, involving a hot tub, about having sex with a professional female runner I knew. Then he said he was just kidding. He had wine crusted in the corner of his mouth. Then, things escalated. "We've both wanted this," Alberto said, propositioning me directly. He said we should kiss and "no one would find out." Before I could respond, he moved his head toward me. I instantly recoiled. "You're drunk," I told him. I needed to get away and I didn't want to wait around to see what he would say. I charged out of my seat, and bolted to the bathroom. I closed the panel door behind me, locked the latch shut, and the harsh, dingy light flickered on. I stood in front of the tiny metal sink, looking in the mirror in a state of disbelief. Tears came. I couldn't catch my breath in the stuffy, claustrophobic air.

From The Longest Race: Inside the Secret World of Abuse, Doping, and Deception on Nike's Elite Running Team by Kara Goucher with Mary Pilon. Copyright © 2023 by Kara Goucher and Mary Pilon. Reprinted by permission of Gallery Books, a Division of Simon & Schuster, Inc.

If you or someone you know has been a victim of sexual abuse, text "STRENGTH" to the Crisis Text Line at 741-741 to be connected to a certified crisis counselor.