Sexual harassment on women’s US Biathlon team leads to SafeSport investigation — and sanctions

American biathlon champion Joanne Reid was sexually harassed and abused for years by a ski wax technician while racing on the elite World Cup circuit, a watchdog group that monitors sexual abuse allegations in Olympic sports. When the two-time Olympian complained, she was told his behavior was just part of male European culture.

Teammate Deedra Irwin says she had to intervene repeatedly to protect Reid. Outraged by what she called “a culture of intimidation and misogyny,” Irwin, a biathlete in the Army National Guard, notified her military superiors, who demanded immediate action.

Only then, in April 2021, did US biathlon officials alert the US Center for SafeSport.

The 18-month investigation found that Petr “Gara” Garabik had repeatedly engaged in sexual harassment and unwanted sexual contact with Reid. The Czech national was suspended for six months and placed on probation until December 2024.

Wax technicians play a crucial role in biathlon, which combines cross-country skiing with precision rifle shooting, preparing skis for the day’s snow conditions so racers glide down the trails with ease. It was a power dynamic that made Reid vulnerable.

An athlete sexually harassed by a wax tech is said to have difficulty getting him to stop, “for fear it would compromise the athlete’s performance,” according to confidential SafeSport reports on the investigation obtained by The Associated Press.

It was an argument Reid had made in complaints to U.S. biathlon officials since 2019.

Yet it would be two years before US Biathlon took the matter to SafeSport, established to investigate and punish abuse in Olympic sports in the wake of the Larry Nassar USA Gymnastics sex abuse scandal, which exposed flaws in the handling of American sports leaders having sex. cases of abuse.

SafeSport’s investigation found that Garabik “engaged in a pattern of sexualized behavior” involving Reid over the course of six years, “including sexualized comments and inappropriate sexualized touching.”

Garabik’s behavior was well known and team officials behaved as if it was normal, or “European,” said Reid, 31, the daughter of Olympic speed skater Beth (Heiden) Reid and niece of Olympic speed skating superstar Eric Heiden.

“New women on the team were warned about him,” Reid told the AP. For years she refrained from complaining, she said, as she tried to find her footing as a new team member and out of fear that the ski wax technicians would quit, leaving the team in trouble.

Garabik told the AP in an email that the case against him was “complete nonsense from the start.” But he acknowledged to SafeSport investigators and the AP that his comments were sexual in nature.

“I have never done anything to anyone without their consent and the fact that I had a few jokes and hints was never sexual pressure,” he told the AP. “We always laughed about it. By that I mean other team members.”

Last May, six months after SafeSport completed its investigation, US Biathlon retroactively changed its pre-qualification criteria for the World Cup team – and Reid was excluded. Reid had to start over and took part in qualifying races. The change did not affect the status of anyone else on the team.

Reid said she believed the move was in retaliation for drawing attention to US Biathlon’s handling of the issue. She turned down a spot on the U.S. national team and stopped attending practices.

“They treat me like a naughty nine-year-old and it’s very difficult for me to be in a team environment because of this environment,” Reid told the AP.

“There was no way I was going to put on my uniform and represent them on the world stage.”

American Biathlon CEO Jack Gierhart denied that the World Cup rules change was retaliation, saying in an interview that it was developed and approved by a committee that includes athletes to set standards to help the organization achieve its goals.

Asked about Reid’s SafeSport case at the American Biathlon annual meeting in December, he said policies have been implemented to address the issues.

“Athlete safety is a critical issue for us,” Gierhart told the biathletes and officials attending the Zoom session. “We’re always working to improve how we approach this, how we train our athletes… how we train our staff and the safeguards we put in place.”

“I don’t think there is any excuse,” he added. “It was a process. The system worked based on a reporting procedure, a decision and a sanction procedure.”

Reid told investigators that the sexual harassment began in 2016, with constant touching, unwanted hugs, lewd jokes and pats on the butt. She was in her early twenties and Garabik in his late forties.

He grabbed her, touched her and hugged her when they were in the washroom together, made inappropriate jokes when she bent over to put on her skis, and sent a stream of flirting emojis via WhatsApp, she said.

In March 2017, Garabik showed up drunk at her hotel room, forced his way inside, held her down and tried to kiss her as she fought back, the SafeSport report said. Her roommate arrived and pulled him away, it said.

In 2019, Reid, with Irwin’s support, reported the abuse to then-coach Bernd Eisenbichler. He removed Reid from Garabik’s laundry rotation and reprimanded him, but the behavior did not stop, the report said, and two days later Garabik grabbed Reid’s buttocks while giving her a good-luck hug before a race.

Garabik’s “inappropriate behavior,” even after being reprimanded by a coach, indicates “an ongoing potential risk to the safety of others, especially women in sports,” according to SafeSport’s findings.

In 2020, Reid and Irwin took their concerns to American Biathlon High Performance Director Lowell Bailey, and they told the AP that he responded that you can’t teach a European sexual harassment rules.

Asked by the AP about the answer, Bailey said: “That’s not true.”

“Maybe they misinterpreted it,” he added.

Asked whether he should have filed a report with SafeSport after the women complained, he said: “I can’t remember the details. I honestly can’t talk about that.”

In February 2021, a year after the athletes complained to Bailey, Garabik told Reid at an event in Slovenia that a package on a high shelf was hers – then grabbed her between the legs and lifted her by the crotch to reach it coming, the SafeSport. findings said.

In a statement two months later for US Biathlon, Irwin said female athletes were treated with disrespect, “and then everyone refuses to address it, calling it ‘part of European culture’ or ‘just a joke’.”

US Biathlon banned Garabik from working with its teams in November 2021.

During the SafeSport investigation, Reid endured hours of interrogations, a process that retraumatized her, she said.

“Do I serve a higher purpose if I relive this?” she said in an April 2021 letter to US Biathlon. “Does the specific time I opened my door well after midnight to a knock that turned out to be my drunken ski technician, only to have his tongue down my throat seconds later, help a database? What day was it? How many centimeters did his tongue go down? Did it taste like lager or was it strong?’

SafeSport CEO Ju’Riese Colón acknowledged that investigations can be stressful, but said it is important work.

“Cultural change requires responsibility,” she said in an email to the AP. “We understand that reliving traumatic experiences is difficult for those who come forward, and the center has taken steps to help minimize that impact.”

To protect Reid from Garabik, Irwin told the AP she would come between Reid and the wax tech. The women became “battle buddies,” she said — a military term meaning soldiers care for each other.

“You never go anywhere without your battle buddy, so it’s always two against one and there’s always someone who can corroborate your story,” she told the AP in December while racing in Austria.

In November, after years of silence, Reid made her SafeSport story public on her popular Instagram and Facebook pages, and was encouraged by the outpouring of support.

“I’m actually absolutely floored by the number of people coming out of the woodwork on my behalf and the safety of our women’s team and biathletes in general,” Reid told the AP.

“Even though it sucks right now, it’s a great and inspiring thing.”