It appears that Paraguayan Olympics swimmer Luana Alonso — who was banished from Paraguay’s quarters in the Olympic Village this week — has been annoying her country’s Olympics officials for longer than we thought after an interview she gave before even going to Paris resurfaced in which she openly said she’d rather have been swimming for the United States instead of Paraguay.
Alonso was banished from the Olympic Village on Monday after Paraguay’s Olympics officials accused her of “inappropriate behavior,” which apparently included sneaking off to Disneyland Paris when she was told not to go and wearing skimpy outfits.
On Tuesday, though, the swimmer insisted that she was not banished and simply left because she was no longer competing in the international games.
But now, more news is trickling out that she has been upsetting Paraguayan Olympics officials for a lot longer than we knew, especially with the comment about swimming for the U.S.A.
Indeed, it might have been possible for Alonso to have become a U.S. Olympian because a few years ago, the now 20-year-old swimmer was a student at Southern Methodist University in Texas and swam for the school.
Apparently, she was wistful for her life in the United States, too, because a few weeks before she left for Paris, the Paraguayan actually said in an interview, “I want to represent the United States more,” according to Paraguayan news outlet HOY.
In the same interview, Alonso also seemed annoyed that some people in her home country had discouraged her before she even left for Paris when they insisted that no Paraguayan woman had ever made a mark in the Olympics and discounted her abilities because she was a universality inclusion in the Paris Games.
A universality pick is an athlete who has been given a chance to compete in the Olympics even if they don’t exactly have the same qualifications as others to help a country that is otherwise underrepresented in international sports have representation at the Games.
Alonso’s own coach reportedly snarked back at his swimmer, though, and accused her of not working hard enough to be a real Olympian.
“I read that she wants to compete for the United States,” COP President Camilo Perez said. “There is no universality there. She came here as a Paraguayan. She has to train a lot more to represent USA, her times have to be much better.”
Paraguayan officials also claimed that Alonso distracted Paraguay athletes by parading around the quarters in “skimpy outfits,” according to the Daily Mail.
Whatever she did or did not do in the Olympic Village, her competition was already finished by July 31 when she did not make it into the semifinals to be able to swim in the games. Immediately after failing to qualify, she announced her retirement from the sport.
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