It�s an image that isn�t easily forgettable.

Marie-Claude Savard-Gagnon, looking like death warmed over, pale as a ghost, weak enough to fall over. Her pairs partner, Luc Bradet, not looking much healthier, but trying to support his fragile partner. Two Canadian Olympians struck down by the Nagano flu on the most important day of their life.

And still skating.

They had been advised against it. Their coach, Paul Martini, knew they would not be able to skate at anywhere near their full-strength under the restraints the illness placed upon them, but told them it was their decision. These two skaters, at the Olympic Games for the first time, did not want to go home and have to say they�d given up.

It was the Olympics. No regrets.

The music from Gone with the Wind, their music they�d chosen for their freeskate, filled the building, and they began to skate. But halfway through, with the weakness of the flu obviously hurting them, Marie-Claude stopped. Stopped, and rested her head on her partner�s shoulder, and for a moment, just wept.

And then they continued. With the crowd cheering them on, the sickened team skated right through to the end of their program, and then when the music finally stopped, when every bit of energy they had left in them was gone, they knew one thing - they had finished.

There would be no W/D beside their names in Olympic history. They had completed the competition, and they were disappointed, perhaps... but they would be able to look back upon their first Olympics, and know they persevered.

Exhaustion. Disappointment. But no regrets.