(NEW YORK) — Kara Goucher, one of the fastest female long-distance runners in American history, describes a “secret world” of professional running in her new memoir.

“​​Running is life-changing,” Goucher told Good Morning America. “It’s given me so much freedom and strength and power.”

In her new memoir, The Longest Race: Inside the Secret World of Abuse, Doping, and Deception on Nike’s Elite Running Team, Goucher says for the first time publicly that she is the woman behind the sexual assault allegations that led to her former coach Alberto Salazar to be banned from the sport for life in 2021.

“Alberto Salazar was very, very powerful. He was a legend. He won the Boston Marathon. He won the New York City Marathon three years in a row,” said Goucher, who added that as she got to know him, she liked him more.

Goucher said she first met Salazar in 2004 when she and her now-husband were approached by Nike to join the prestigious running team “The Oregon Project,” an immersive training environment for an elite team of athletes.

“We just couldn’t believe this program, all of the money behind it, all of the equipment behind it. I became the first woman to join and I was just excited with that backing,” she said. “Where could I take my running?”

She said she realized that the opportunity could turn into something more and that Salazar could help her get to the Olympics.

“At first I just wanted something new, but the longer I was there, I really believed that he was the person that could get me there, so much so that later on I felt like I was nothing without him,” said Goucher, who went on to represent the United States in the 2008 Beijing Olympics and 2012 London Olympics.

Goucher said that while she made great strides with Salazar and was running some of her fastest times, she rationalized what she said was unusual — Salazar sometimes personally massaging his athletes.

“I had never seen a coach give an athlete a massage,” she said. “And so I just thought, ‘That’s Alberto. He’s just so dedicated. He’s even willing to give his athletes massages.'”

Adding, “It was unusual at first, but I kind of convinced myself that that was normal.”

Goucher said she felt something was wrong when she was in Rieti, Italy, for a race and she said she found herself alone in a hotel room with Salazar.

“He was giving me a post-workout, pre-race, what he would call a ‘flush,'” said Goucher. “If I’m being honest, I just totally froze. I was thinking, ‘There’s no way he’s touching me like that. I’m imagining this. He’s just a bad masseuse.'”

Goucher said a similar incident happened years later while the two were in Lisbon for a race.

“He goes to give me a massage, it was the same situation where I felt his finger was going where it shouldn’t be going. And I was so uncomfortable,” she said.

At the time, Goucher said she didn’t tell anyone about the massage.

“I felt shameful about it. I also felt like maybe it was just a mistake,” she said.

Goucher left The Oregon Project in 2011 and said she never spoke about the alleged assaults until she was questioned by lawyers about doping allegations brought against Salazar by the U.S. Anti-Doping Agency. In 2019, Salazar was suspended for four years by that agency for doping violations — allegations he has denied.

In 2021, the U.S. Center for SafeSport, a governing body to protect professional athletes from sexual abuse, banned Salazar from the sport at the Olympic level for life for “sexual misconduct.” The organization did not identify the accuser and the New York Times later reported that an arbitrator’s ruling indicated the ban was based on a finding of violations that included two instances of inappropriate touching during an athletic massage. In her memoir, Goucher says she testified for SafeSport about the alleged touching by Salazar and that her allegations were the basis for the lifetime ban.

Nike said in a statement to ABC News, in part, “Sexual misconduct has no place in sports or society and is something we stand vehemently against…. Alberto is no longer a contracted coach, and we shuttered the Oregon Project several years ago … 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.”

Salazar also told ABC News, in part, “Any claim that Ms. Goucher was sexually assaulted by me is categorically untrue…. I have never sexually assaulted Ms. Goucher and never would have done so. The accusation is deeply hurtful and abhorrent and contrary to my fundamental beliefs as a husband, father and deeply devout Catholic.”

Goucher says she has mixed feelings knowing Salazar will not participate in the sport at the highest levels again.

“Honestly, it makes me a little sad because I know how much he loves it. I think that’s his whole life,” she said. “But at the end of the day, he should not be coaching.”

Goucher wrote in her book that ultimately her power is not in her legs — but in her voice.

“It is my responsibility to use my voice,” she said, “and to fight for other people.”

Statement from Nike

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 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.

Statement from Alberto Salazar

Any claim that Ms. Goucher was sexually assaulted by me is categorically untrue. I am deeply saddened by Ms. Goucher’s false claim. I worked with Ms. Goucher as her coach for nearly seven years, from October 2004 to September 2011, when Ms. Goucher was 26 to 33 years old. We had a strong professional relationship, and Ms. Goucher and her husband became friends with my wife and family during the time we worked together. Ms. Goucher achieved a number of professional successes during my coaching of her, but when I became unable to provide the coaching and support that Ms. Goucher needed to achieve her goals, Ms. Goucher left and retained another coach. I have never sexually assaulted Ms. Goucher and never would have done so. The accusation is deeply hurtful and abhorrent and contrary to my fundamental beliefs as a husband, father and deeply devout Catholic.

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(NEW YORK) — Puerto Rico shut out Israel in the World Baseball Classic Monday night, beating them 10-0 in eight innings.

Four pitchers retired all 24 batters they faced, marking the competition’s first-ever combined perfect game.

Puerto Rico will next face off against Dominican Republic on Wednesday night.

Watch highlights from Monday night’s match-up, as well as other games from the World Baseball Classic, below:

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(ROCK HILL, S.C.) — Friday night high school football games are an American tradition. But only one town — Rock Hill, South Carolina — calls itself “Football City.” That’s because the city of 75,000 says it has turned out more NFL players per capita than any other place in the U.S.

From just a handful of high schools have come nearly two dozen players who later turned pro. That reputation spurs big dreams for the high school stars hoping to become tomorrow’s next pro athletes.

J’Zavien Currence, 14, is one of those standout players. A freshman at South Pointe High School, he’s starting varsity on one of the best teams in Rock Hill. He’s top ranked not only in South Carolina, but the entire country.

For J’Zavien, football is a family affair. Jay Currence, J’Zavien’s dad and coach, also played football growing up in Rock Hill. Some of his teammates went on to the NFL, including cornerback Derek Ross and tight end Ben Watson.

But even for the best young players, the dream of turning pro doesn’t usually materialize. About 7% of high school football players nationwide go on to play in college. Only 1.5% of college players make it to the NFL, according to the NCAA.

Jibrille Fewell was one of those kids who bet everything on football. He grew up in College Downs, a historically Black, low-income neighborhood in Rock Hill. He became a standout player in high school, and a football scholarship paid for his college education.

But when Fewell didn’t make it to the NFL, he came back to Rock Hill, and his mental health took a turn for the worse.

“I felt like a failure, and I didn’t know what was really next, so I kind of went into a dark era,” Fewell told ABC News.

Now Fewell coaches youth football. He’s trying to make sure that young athletes know how to both play the game and also have the resilience to be OK when it ends. He brings in mental health advocates and even former players to his football camps to help kids think beyond the game.

“Football in this community is only one route and everybody trying to go through that one door,” Fewell said.

Phillip Adams, another standout high school player, made it through that door. But his NFL career was plagued by injuries, including a broken ankle that required surgery and two concussions over three games. He left the NFL in 2016 and returned to Rock Hill, where he struggled with his mental and physical health.

In 2021, tragedy struck when Adams shot and killed Dr. Robert Lesslie, his wife Barbara and two of their grandchildren, along with James Lewis, an HVAC technician working in the home. Another worker, Robert Shook, was critically wounded and later died. Adams took his own life during a standoff with police.

After the incident, Boston University conducted an autopsy of Adams’ brain to determine if chronic traumatic encephalopathy, or CTE, could have played a role in the incident. The autopsy found that Adams had an “unusually severe” form of the disease.

“The combination of poor impulse control, paranoia, poor decision making, emotional volatility, rage and violent tendencies caused by frontal lobe damage could converge to lower an individual’s threshold for homicidal acts,” neuropathologist Dr. Ann McKee said at the time.

McKee noted that Adams’ football career put him at high risk for the development of CTE, a diagnosis that cannot be confirmed before death.

Recently, several high-profile injuries in the NFL, including Damar Hamlin’s cardiac arrest and Tua Tagovailoa’s concussions, have raised questions about the safety of the game and concern for the players.

The NFL has the highest rate of reported concussions among the four major U.S. professional sports leagues, stated a 2021 report in the journal Nature.

In a statement, an NFL spokesperson said the league “continues to make the game safer through better equipment, rules changes and efforts to reduce head contact,” noting that the number of concussions are “25% lower than just a few years ago.” The spokesperson also said the NFL has built a team of “world-class” medical experts on the sidelines in case of an emergency, adding that emergency action plans are in place at all NFL fields and practice facilities.

Concern for player safety is also present at the high school level, where football has the highest rate of concussions among any other sport, according to a 2019 epidemiology study published in the journal Pediatrics. Researchers compared concussions rates in 20 different high school sports from 2013 to 2018.

For Jay Currence, there’s “always that slight fear” of injury risk for his son. At the end of last season, J’Zavien sprained his ankle, taking him out of the last two games of the season, including the big game against his rival high school.

“You just try to prepare best you can, take care of your body best you can, play as safe as you can,” Currence said.

At 14 years old, J’Zavien says he already has multiple offers to play college football at Division I schools.

“We also talk about that, you’re not always going to play, and one day, they’re going to take your jersey from you and you’re going to have to be a productive person and a citizen out here, even after you play,” J’Zavien said.

The families of James Lewis and Robert Shook did not respond to ABC News’ request for comment. The Lesslie family and the Adams family declined to comment.

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