Nadia Says It’s All Business, No Love

FT. LAUDERDALE, Fla. — Former Olympic gold medalist Nadia Comaneci says she has a business relationship with the married father of four who helped her escape from Romania, not a romantic one.

“He’s not my lover boy, he’s my manager,” she told the Sun-Sentinel in Ft. Lauderdale during a telephone interview Tuesday.

The 28-year-old gold medalist, who has shared a hotel room with Constantin Panait for the last week, added: “It is all a big lie and you are very bad. . . . (Panait) is just trying to help me. We are not lovers. Ask Constantin. He will tell you.”

Panait, 36, also spoke from the couple’s room.

“There is no romance,” he said. “I am just her manager, only that. I am trying to help her make movies and commercials and maybe get a book of her life. That’s all.”

He and Comaneci arrived in New York City two weeks ago after the 28-year-old gymnast left her homeland with six others on Nov. 28.

At a news conference last week, Comaneci and Panait, a roofer, told reporters they would live together in south Florida. When asked about a romance, Comaneci blushed. And when a reporter wondered if she knew Panait is married and a father, she answered: “So what?”

That remark cast Comaneci in an unfavorable light with much of the public and with some national advertisers, who indicated that their interest in her had cooled.

Comaneci and Panait have stayed at a Pompano Beach hotel since Dec. 5. Panait has not returned to the home he shared with his wife, Maria, 25, and their children, ages 2 to 6. “I don’t know when I will go back home,” he said Tuesday. “But Maria knows all of this. I have called her to explain everything. This is all not true about a romance.”

Maria Panait, who has not seen her husband since Nov. 2, seemed surprised and relieved.

“Really? That’s good news,” she said. “It sure makes me feel a lot better. But, I will believe this about him being her manager when I hear it from him face-to-face when he comes home.”