Athens - Hestrie Cloete flew out of the Athens Olympics at 04:00 on Sunday, five hours after winning her second Olympic silver high jump medal.
Cloete left to continue her campaign in the IAAF Golden League that continues in Brussels on Friday and ends with the final in Monaco in just over a fortnight.
Cloete left, unaware of the furore back home after a Sunday newspaper reported racial remarks made at a family farm in Coligny during a gathering to watch the world champion compete in the final.
According to a Sunday Times report, Cloete's husband, Andries, told their reporter, who had gone to their home in Coligny to watch the women's high jump event, how he had gone out of his way to deny access to a black journalist who wanted to be with the family.
In addition, they called National Olympic Committee of South Africa (Nocsa) president Sam Ramsamy a "coolie" and made a number of racist remarks during the evening.
News of the incident swept through the SA Olympic camp, leaving a collective sense of despair for Cloete who carried the weight of the nation on her narrow shoulders and faltered at 2.04m to lose the Olympic gold medal to Russia's Yelena Slesarenko on Saturday night.
Cloete appeared tense both during competition and afterwards at the international media conference where she said she was going to take until the end of the year to decide on her future in world athletics.
"I've said I'll make a decision by the end of the year," said Cloete who won her first world championship gold medal in Edmonton in 2001, then said she would like to have a baby if she won the Olympic gold medal.
"I'm not going to decide now.
"It's too soon after the Olympic event.
I need to settle down and think about this.
I want to be clear-minded when I decide."
Cloete said her silver was nothing to be disappointed about.
"I didn't go backwards here," she said. "I won silver in Sydney and another one here - I'm happy with that.
"My two world champs golds mean a lot to me.
I would have loved the gold here obviously, but I was jumping off first and it was difficult to put pressure on Yelena.
When I had my failure at 2.04m, I decided to see if I could pressurise her with a 2.06m, but it didn't come off.
"She deserved the gold medal, the way she competed.
"I give that to her."
