[selesrules]

vote

[fleemke³]

We can't say if she's ill or not but she doesn't look healthy imo!

[downtheline]

It doesn't matter what she looks like as much as that the rumors are not being well refuted yet. She might have thyroid disorder!

I doubt it though.

However, I do not understand how a top-ten player can compete and not be eating. She would have no energy.

This must be a recent thing for her, so it will take time for her to believe that she has a problem. If she is having odd behaviors, I would like to know about them. She sure seems to be under a lot of pressure since she hit number 5 in the world.

Her look is more of a model's look than a curvy adolescent Kournikova.

In certain ways, her look has a higher status, and I think she knows that she is capable of big things as a player and for endorsements.

[Sean]

Dani is fat i think she needs to go on a diet.

[Smart]

it isn't fair to do polls about her health.

[AmErIcAn]

people please leave Dani alone shes so destressed at the moment.

[heninrules]

Shes obviously lost a lot of weight but it is up to her to admit she has a problem but i'm sure she'll be ok as long as her coach, parents and the rest of her team helps her through it

[mandy7]

she's not annorexic, you are all just making a big deal out of it. she lost weight, that's true. but so all you people know: when you are anorexic YOU CAN'T PLAY TENNIS WITHOUT DYING!! My best friends' sister had it so i know what it is, it's a disease and you can't compete in any sport when you're sick, so one more time to all you people: SHE IS NOT ANOREXIC!!!

[AmErIcAn]

Noone really knows, btw if she has recently become anorexic then she still will have energy lot of ppl with anorexia dont become terminally ill(cant move) until after a few years. not months.

[Vincent]

Originally Posted by mandy7

she's not annorexic, you are all just making a big deal out of it. she lost weight, that's true. but so all you people know: when you are anorexic YOU CAN'T PLAY TENNIS WITHOUT DYING!! My best friends' sister had it so i know what it is, it's a disease and you can't compete in any sport when you're sick, so one more time to all you people: SHE IS NOT ANOREXIC!!!

Exactly, i guess people who catch this diesease can't even walk properly, they would rather stay at home and no contacts with sunlight.

[best best better]

Just wanna take Mandy7 up on something. Many many long distance track and field athletes admit to always battling their weight, and fighting eating disorders. It's impossible to have an eating disorder and be at the TOP of your game (imo)... but then, Dani isn't at the top of her game.

I'm really loathe to talk about this issue because it's just adding gristle to all the demons that Daniela appears to have in her head right now. And by continually commenting on it, I kind of feel a party to it.

[*JR*]

(from Jon Wertheim's column of Nov. 6th, 2001; highlighted by me):

Carling Bassett was the Anna Kournikova of the 1980s, a player of considerable talent but one whose popularity was based as much on her looks as her tennis. Male fans were reduced to cat-calling construction workers when she played. Sponsors, tournaments and the women's tour had no reservations about promoting her ahead of higher ranked but less pulchritudinous players. There's even an odd numerological symmetry: Kournikova and Bassett share a career-high ranking of No. 8.

Still, the comparisons don't go on forever. First, Bassett actually won a few tournaments -- including one at the onset of her career -- so she never schlepped around Kournikova's albatross. And whereas Kournikova prides herself on her queenly iciness and takes pains to control her image, Bassett had a disarming, gum-smacking, teenaged innocence to her. After Bassett came from nowhere in April 1983 to reach the finals of the Amelia Island tournament, losing in three tight sets to Chris Evert, Bud Collins interviewed Bassett, then 16. "I didn't know you were this good," he remarked. "Neither did I!" she responded.

Owing to her game as well as her winning personality, Bassett will be inducted into the Canadian Sports Hall of Fame on Wednesday night in Toronto. She is the first female tennis player to receive the honor. "It's such a thrill," she says. "My whole family, old friends, people I haven't seen in years but who were instrumental in my career will be there. I live in Florida, but I'm still very much a Canadian."

The daughter of Susan Carling Bassett and John Bassett, a former Canadian Davis Cup player and minority owner of the Toronto Maple Leafs and the USFL's Tampa Bay Bandits, Carling had an aptitude for tennis that was quickly apparent. By age 12, she was the best player in Canada and decamped to the Bollettieri Academy. She turned pro after winning the 1982 Orange Bowl. Within a year, she was an international celebrity who had signed a modeling deal with Eileen Ford, played lucrative exhibitions all over the world and, bolstered by a U.S. Open semifinal appearance, was steadily climbing the rankings ladder.

Bassett now reveals that she was also battling an eating disorder at the time. As the pressures mounted -- and, as she puts is, "I was wrapped into too many little worlds" -- anorexia and bulimia took over her life. "It was like a drug addict doing drugs," she says. "It affected everything: my practicing, my discipline, my sleep, my mentality. I was 15, 16, 17, and that's a real vulnerable area."

[Sam L]

I said no because if she was, I would think she wouldn't have the endurance to play these long tennis matches but she's borderline.

[goldenlox]

If Carling Bassett was the Anna Kournikova of the 1980's, how come neither of my parents ever heard of her? And my dad is a real sports fan.

[Dawn Marie]

U can have the onset of a eating disorder and not be TIRED or OUT OF ENERGY. It is obvious Daniela is not in the latter stages..

Just because she is out there playing does not mean she can not have something wrong with her such as a anorexia nervosa.