On the Shoulders of Giants

Qu Yunxia. Zhang Linli. Zhang Lirong. Three names that the vast majority of Irish sporting fans had never heard of prior to Monday 16th August 1993. After that day, the very utterance of those same three names would send shivers down the spine of even the most casual track and field supporter. 

The 1990s provided a decade of unparalleled success and moments of joyous celebration for fans of Irish sport. Kicked off by Jackie’s army at Italia ‘90, Michael Carruth’s gold winning performance at the Barcelona Olympics in ‘92, Ger Loughnane’s Clare hurlers breaking the curse of Biddy Early at a raucous GAA headquarters in the mid-90s, Michelle Smith’s Gold medal haul at Atlanta ‘96 (at the time we were none the wiser as to what shadow would ultimately be cast over this achievement), Ken Doherty’s World Snooker Championship win in 1997 and Catriona McKiernan’s London Marathon win in 1998 some of the many highlights.

It was an era when sport was on terrestrial tv. There was more coverage of sporting events than in decades past, and we had yet to cross over fully into the battle of tv rights and paywalls. For those nestling down into their living room armchairs across Ireland on that warm August evening in 1993, their choice was Green Fingers with Gerry Daly on RTE 1 or the World Athletics Championships in Stuttgart on Network 2. It was an easy choice.

Of all the incredible sporting feats and all the champions that illuminated our lives during this era, there was one star that shone brighter than the rest and in a truly unique way held the unconditional love of the entire nation. That star was the Ballymore Cobh distance runner Sonia O’Sullivan.

George Hamilton set the scene, as he has done for so many great sporting occasions, with Sonia lining up as favourite for the 3000m title. Little was known of the Chinese athletes, Qu Yunxia, Zhang Linli, and Zhang Lirong. In Stuttgart, people were talking about the Chinese team. Their continual hard training and limited recovery between heats catching the attention of other coaches. Added to this, they marched about the city in pairs, their tracksuits immaculate, hair cut short, looking like they meant business. As the Championships went on, the noise around the Chinese team grew, the way they were training and racing led people to believe that something was amiss, it just didn’t sit right. Nothing to worry about though for the Irish viewers who sat at home with great expectation. 

All seemed to be going perfectly well for Sonia O’Sullivan, as the athletes moved through 2000m. Yvonne Murray of Great Britain led a tightly compact field. At 700m to go Coach Ma stood up and wildly gesticulated to the Chinese athletes, who instantly moved into the lead. The sudden move caught O’Sullivan off guard and before she knew it, she was 10 metres back. 

The utter devastation felt by Irish sports fans after the 3000m final has had few equals. This devastation was driven by a level of expectation that we’ve rarely felt as a nation about any of our sporting stars. But then again, we’ve rarely had a talented superstar quite like Sonia.

Determined not to be pushed out of the medals again, when Sonia O’Sullivan saw the Algerian athlete Hassiba Boulmerka make a move in the 1500m final 6 days later, she responded. The plan was to get in between the Chinese athletes and prevent another clean sweep. In fourth place at the bell, this time Sonia was in touch, and on the back straight, she showed her class. The Silver medal a remarkable achievement given the circumstances.

The impact of these Championships on Sonia’s career was something she later reflected on with Adharanand Finn. After 1993, reports of the type of training the Chinese athletes were undertaking began to filter back to Europe. The ultimate competitor, Sonia increased her training load and training intensity in a bid to remain to the fore. Although immediate success came Sonia’s way, she later understood how this increase in workload and the pressure on her body led to as she described it, “… the downfall of ’96. The constant desire to train harder, better, to push myself and thinking more was always better.”

Two years of unequalled success in 1994 and 1995 were followed by two turbulent years in 1996 and 1997. After 1996 Sonia began working with one of Britain’s top coaches Alan Storey. His more relaxed approach that put emphasis on recovery took a few years to bear fruit. But when it did, Sonia was back! At the World Cross Country Championships in Marrakech in March 1998, over successive days Sonia O’Sullivan won Gold in the short course (4 km) and long course (8 km) events.

The Chinese women’s team dominated the 1993 World Championships, winning three Gold, two Silver, and one Bronze across the 1500m, 3000m and 10000m events. In the 15 World Championships that have taken place since, no Chinese female athlete has won a medal on the track. Accusations of doping and the name ‘chemical sisters’ is the legacy that hangs over the Chinese distance runners of 1993. Aside from the medals they won, the impact on the training and approach of athletes like Sonia may never be fully understood. One thing is for sure, through the moments of disappointment, like the 3000m final in 1993, and along the journey of ups and downs that spanned Sonia O’Sullivan’s career, a singular bond grew between the Irish people and their greatest ever athlete, a bond that still exists as strong as ever today, 30 years later.

Tadhg Crowley

Consider the number of training hours an elite athlete puts down in pursuit of fast times, and the sacrifices they make to be the best in their chosen event - the early morning track sessions, the late-night runs in the wind and rain, the strict diet and gym routines, and juggling all that with balancing your sport with work, the raising of children, and managing of a home. Now consider what it might take to forego all that work and those sacrifices, to give away your last chance to represent your family, your club, your country at the biggest stage of all, at the Olympic Games.

Ireland’s first world class female athlete Mary Purcell had just won Bronze in the 1500m at the 1980 European Indoor Championships in Sindelfingen, a city in West Germany, and the Moscow Olympics were a few short months away. She was in the form of her life but instead of being focused on the ‘Games’, Purcell was weighing up whether competing in the Soviet Union against a field of athletes, many of whom had spent their lives training as part of state sponsored doping programmes, was worth the effort.

At the Montreal Olympics 4 years earlier, Mary Purcell ran a personal best and Irish national record of 4:08.63 in the 1500m heats but swamped by an increasingly dominant pool of East German and Russian athletes she failed to progress. At 31, Purcell knew that Moscow was her last Olympic opportunity, she also knew that the times that the Eastern Bloc athletes were running were ones she was unable to match. Records were tumbling and rumours were rife. For Purcell, who studied pharmacy at UCD and now worked at LEO Laboratories in Crumlin, the drug taking was more obvious than ever. She later recalled her experiences to Ian O’Riordan for a 2018 Irish Times article, “I remember walking behind some of the Russian sprinters, and you know physiological things happen when you’re on certain substances. …. the deepening of the voice, the elongation of the face, loads of little tell-tale signs.” After her exit in the Montreal Heats, Purcell was devasted, “I just said to myself, ‘what the hell is going on here?’ It just knocked the stuffing out of me, because you just knew. There was little testing, and the testing is only as good as the analytic methods you use.”

The hugely competitive Purcell had always been driven to find those 1%’s and to maximise her potential. Long before altitude training was a stable of every elite athlete’s programme, Purcell went on running camps at 6000ft in St. Mortiz. She was clocking up 130 miles every week, including 30 mile runs over the Dublin Mountains all under the guidance of her husband and coach Peter Purcell. The fact that Purcell worked so hard to find legitimate and legal ways to be competitive alongside her knowledge of pharmaceuticals and their potential impact on performance must have made what was happening on the international stage all the more sickening.

Mary Purcell (nee Tracey) was the dominant female athlete in Ireland throughout the 70's. Alongside her appearances at the Olympics in Munich 1972 (800m and 1500m) and Montreal 1976 (1500m) she also competed at two European Championships, five World Cross Country Championships, and won 13 Irish national titles. She broke 12 Irish records and went unbeaten on home soil from 1972 to 1976.

As the Moscow Games grew closer, Purcell became more disillusioned. In the end, she quietly withdrew and began to focus on longer distances. After the birth of her second daughter in 1981, Purcell moved up to the marathon. She won the national marathon title in Limerick in 1982 and the Dublin Marathon in 1983.

Although no athletes were caught doping at the 1980 Moscow Olympics, it was later revealed that many were using testosterone and other drugs for which tests had not been developed. A 1989 report by a committee of the Australian Senate claimed that "there is hardly a medal winner at the Moscow Games, certainly not a gold medal winner ... who is not on one sort of drug or another: usually several kinds. The Moscow Games might well have been called the Chemists' Games".

In 2018, Mary Purcell was inducted into the Athletics Ireland Hall of Fame. Reflecting on her remarkable 12-year career one can’t help but swing between moments of ground-breaking success and thoughts of what might have been.

Tadhg Crowley

It is the early 1990s and up on Harbour View Road in Cork city’s northside neighbourhood of Knocknaheeny a young Mark Carroll is lacing up his trainers before venturing out on the weekly 15-mile run. The Leevale athlete is joined by his teammates on a hilly loop that takes in the surrounding areas of Kerry Pike, Tower and Blarney. This Sunday long run is the foundation of his training, building aerobic endurance and strengthening the musculoskeletal system to support and compliment the speed sessions on the Mardyke track.

A 103rd place finish at the World Cross Country Junior Championships in Stavanger Norway in 1989 provided Mark Carroll with a harsh realization as to where he ranked on the international stage. On that day, after a humbling experience, Carroll made himself the promise that this would never happen again. Returning to Cork, he approached his training with a different intensity, he upped his mileage and included the weekly long hilly Sunday morning run with his club mates. Two years later in 1991 Mark Carroll became the European U20 5000m champion.

Mark Carroll’s love of running was ignited in the North Monastery Primary School on a cool Spring morning when the students were instructed to run 2 laps of the Monastery. Chasing down the older student Declan O’Callaghan (future training partners) he fell in love with the act of running, there was something strangely appealing about the breathlessness and the burn in his legs and lungs. This passion for running was fostered by Brother John Dooley throughout Carroll’s secondary school years. At the North Monastery Secondary School, Brother John used his extensive knowledge and experience of athletics to guide his students to national success year after year.

Brother John’s influence on Mark Carroll was key, he not only supported the development of the young man as an athlete, but he also presented a pathway for him to further his education and to a scholarship in the US with Providence University in Rhode Island. Unemployment was high in Cork in the 1980s and early 1990s, particularly in the northside of the city due to the closure of many local industries, including the Sunbeam textiles factory in Blackpool. Opportunities were few for young people to further their education at universities and Carroll recognised the significance of being able to pursue his athletic ambitions while attending a third level college.

They say that people make the place, but the place too can shape the person and that is certainly the case with Mark Carroll. An athlete with incredible determination, strength and resilience, characteristics that can undeniably be associated with his place of birth.

The development of the northside of Cork city began back in the 1950s when large numbers of houses were built to accommodate people who had been residing in the city’s tenements. Cork City Council then began constructing social housing in Knocknaheeny around the early 1970s. By the late 1980s the area was suffering from negative press, due to social problems, and the people that grew up there at the time often claimed that they were discriminated against because of where they were from. With this negative perception weighing down on Knocknaheeny, its people developed a toughness, a togetherness, and an enormous pride in their neighbourhood.

This mental toughness and determination drove Mark Carroll on. In his prime he had ambitions to hold every national record from the 1500m to the marathon. Such was his range he came mightily close to achieving that goal. At one point, Carroll held the 3000m, 5000m and 10000m records, narrowly missing Ray Flynn’s 1500m record and John Treacy’s marathon record. Carroll still holds the Irish 3000m record. The two-time Olympian won European 5000m Bronze in 1998 to go alongside his seven national senior titles.

After a series of successful years on the track, the 28-year-old Carroll started the year 2000 with serious momentum. The disappointment of missing out on Atlanta ’96, due to injury, meant the Sydney Olympics were firmly in his line of sight. First up though, the European Indoor Championships in Belgium.

When Mark Carroll stood on the start line in the Flanders Arena for the European Indoor 3000m Final in Ghent, his people were crowded around the tv sets in their living rooms or were packed into the pubs along Blarney Street roaring on one of their own. Having comfortably qualified through the heats, Carroll faced an impressive field of athletes including pre-race favourite Portuguese Rui Silva, Briton John Maycock the European Indoor champion from two years previous, and World Bronze medallist Belgian Mohammed Mourhit. With the home crowd roaring him on Mourhit took the early running, leading the field through 800m in a rather pedestrian pace. By the 1000m mark, Mourhit, Maycock and the Italian athlete Di Napoli were jostling for the lead. Meanwhile Carroll was lingering in 8th place, comfortable with the pace and confident he had the ability to cover any move. They hit 2000m and Carroll began to gradually make his way through the field. Mourhit increased the pace with 600m to go, pulling away with Silva, Di Napoli, Maycock and Carroll tucked in behind. When Carroll struck, it was decisive. As they entered the final bend, Mark Carroll raced past Silva to the front and away to victory. He ran straight to Brother John Dooley to collect the tricolour and on to complete his lap of honour.

7:49.24 minutes had past and those same people in Knocknaheeny that were on the edge of their seats or high stools, were now out on the streets, they were out on Harbour View Road singing, dancing and celebrating the local lad who had come good.

Tadhg Crowley

“Come on Mary, you need the run of your life now”

Mary Peters entered the final event of the Pentathlon at the 1972 Munich Olympics just 121 points ahead of pre-games favourite West German Heide Rosendahl. The 200m was one of Rosendahl’s strongest events and the 26 year old took control of the race from the off. Peters needed the race of her life. She had excelled on Day 1 of the pentathlon, scoring big in the high jump, shot put and hurdles but on Day 2 her lead had been cut and victory hung in the balance. As Rosendahl strode to the 200m win, Peters followed across the line in 4th place. Then the excruciating wait for the stadium scoreboard to update….

Mary Peters was born in Liverpool in 1939 but moved to Ballymena, and later Belfast, when her father’s job was relocated to Northern Ireland. Her athletic ability was spotted at an early age, and she soon was being brought in to compete against the boys in her school. Mary's parents Arthur and Hilda nurtured their daughter's love of sport. Peters was an accomplished runner but her talent lay in field events and particularly in the Shot Put. As the years progressed it became evident that her capacity to excel across so many events meant her real potential was in the pentathlon. 

Tragedy struck Mary Peters in her teenage years when her mother died of cancer. Soon after her father remarried, to Peters’ godmother, who had been her mum's bridesmaid. With all this grief and change, sport became Peters obsession; “Athletics was very important to me at that stage because it took me away from the home, where I was finding it very stressful."

Mary Peters competed in her first pentathlon event at the age of 16, finishing 3rd. Her first outing at a major event was the 1958 Commonwealth Games before she became an Olympian in Tokyo (1964). She was guided by Maeve Kyle (Ireland’s first female Olympian) in her early years. Success came in 1970 at the Commonwealth Games in Edinburgh, after a year of intensive training under coach Buster McShane, Peters won Gold in the Pentathlon and Shot Put. She put the significant improvements in her pentathlon performance at the time down to the change from straddle technique to Fosbury Flop in the High Jump.

The Troubles began in Northern Ireland in the late 1960s just as Mary Peters was beginning to find success in Athletics. Years of horrific fighting and the loss of loved ones would deeply impact communities in the region over the next 30+ years. In June 1972 the Provisional Irish Republican Army began a bi-lateral truce (a prelude to secret talks between the IRA and the British government) that had raised hopes of a more peaceful period. However, the truce lasted just two weeks before a summer of violence and deaths ensued. In fact, on the day the Munich Olympics began, the 26th of August, six people were killed in three incidents across Northern Ireland. On her way to compete in Munich Peters was leaving behind a war-torn region, conscious of the negative perception of our home and her people and determined to represent Northern Ireland in a positive light. "I wanted it more than anything ever because Northern Ireland was going through such terrible traumas, and I just hoped that I could bring some good news back to Belfast."

Peters stood at the finish line with her arms around her teammate Ann Wilson waiting for the results. Cameras flashing in her face and a tangible sense of anticipation reverberating around the stadium. Finally the scoreboard clicked into life and alongside Peters name the time 24.08 and realization that Gold is her colour. A victory by 10 points and a new World Record.

Arriving back to Ireland with armed detectives escorting her, the Gold Rolls Royce that was assigned to bring her on her victory parade through Belfast instead whisked her off to safety. An IRA death threat had everyone on edge. The threat had stated that Peters, a Protestant representing Britain, would be shot and her flat bombed. Peters’ father had wanted her to return with him to his new home in Australia, but she was adamant, “My home was in Belfast, my life was there and the people I loved were there.” She was not allowed to return to her flat for 3 months until the threat was deemed to have passed.

Peters knew Munich would be her last Olympics and she took advantage of her success to begin fundraising and advocating for an athletics track for Belfast. By 1976, her dream had been realised and the Mary Peters track was opened at the south end of the Malone Playing Fields in Queen’s University. The success of seeing a high-class athletics facility built for Northern Ireland further motivated Peters. She began work on a charitable trust in 1975, now the Mary Peters Trust, which supports young people to achieve their sporting ambitions. An incredible legacy for the most incredible of athletes.

Tadhg Crowley

“Down on the track we are looking at two men, an Irishman and a Briton. They are going for silver, they are going for bronze. John Treacy has 100 metres to go. In the past Ireland have won Bronze medals: John Caldwell, Freddie Gilroy, Socks Byrne, Jim McCourt, and Hugh Russell. They’ve won Gold: Pat O’Callaghan twice, Bob Tisdall, Ron Delaney. They’ve won Silvers with John McNally, Fred Tiedt, Wilkins, Wilkinson and for the thirteenth time an Irish medal goes to John Treacy!”, Jimmy Magee’s iconic commentary from the Olympic Marathon in Los Angeles 1984. A defining moment in the career of one of Ireland’s greatest athletes perfectly captured by “The Memory Man”. But it wasn’t a straightforward route to the LA Coliseum and Olympic Marathon in August 1984 for John Treacy, in fact, he only fully decided to run the marathon (his first) after the 10,000m Olympic Final (5 days earlier) had not gone to plan.

As a teenager growing up in Waterford, John Treacy’s love for running was fostered by his club St. Nicholas AC and by his older brother Ray, who would pass him down his old running books while also standing in as his coach, sharing his understanding of endurance running and training methods. John’s mileage was made up predominantly of the daily 9-mile commute to school. Success at World Junior Cross Country Championships in 1974 and again in 1975 (3rd place on both occasions) put Treacy on the radar of a number of US colleges and it was to Rhode Island and Providence College he headed.

In the soaring heat of LA, John Treacy had settled into his debut outing over the 26.2. miles by firstly looking to track one of the pre-race favourites Alberto Salazar. The goal to find a nice pack/pace early on and take on board plenty of fluids. Salazar was having an off-day and soon Treacy was eyeing up another target, the Japanese runner Toshihiko Seko. Making up for the error of four years earlier and the lack of preparation for the heat, Treacy had put significant focus on training in warm weather conditions prior to LA and the early evening sun was not taking its toll on the West Waterford man. In fact, at half-way Treacy was still feeling like he was “out for a Sunday stroll”. As the pack reached the 20-mile marker Charlie Spedding made a move and brought with him Treacy, Carlos Lopez (the eventual winner) and Kenya’s Joseph Nzau.

Treacy’s first Olympic experience came in Moscow 1980. The St. Nicholas Athletics Club man headed to the Soviet Union in peak condition, full of confidence and with high ambitions. Running the 10000m heat and in fourth position (within an auto-qualifying spot) with 200m to go, John Treacy collapsed on the track from heat exhaustion. His first ever DNF and on the biggest sporting occasion. Despite medical advice to rest and recover, Treacy was adamant that he would run the 5000m. He safely navigated his way through the heats and semi-final. A 7th place finish in the final and Treacy had left everything out on the track. He had managed to save his Olympics and ended up with a top ten in the world placing. Treacy later reflected on this turnaround as the greatest triumph of his athletics career.

As the lead group passed the 23-mile marathon marker, Carlos Lopes made a break that would win him the Gold medal. Treacy had looked to cover the move but quickly realised that he wasn’t in a position to match Lopes’ speed. And so, it came down to a battle between Spedding and Treacy for silver and bronze. With Charlie Spedding considering the right time to make his next move, Treacy made his. The moment that defined the final placings of the ’84 Olympic Marathon podium happened in the blink of an eye. Treacy headed off down the tunnel into the coliseum having forged a bit of gap on the Englishman. His hope was that he could enjoy the last 500m and soak in the raucous atmosphere inside the stadium.

Treacy had experienced his fair share of excitable crowds and ferocious atmospheres. In 1979, the World Cross Country Championships were held on a muddy Greenpark Racecourse in Limerick, and the home support had the defending champion 21-year-old John Treacy to cheer on. On a wet and cold Sunday afternoon in March, Treacy had as he described it ‘the perfect race’. Despite the pressure of racing on Irish soil as champion, cheered on by thousands of wild supporters who invaded the course at various points, the Waterford man effortlessly raced to victory.

Charlie Spedding had other ideas. A quick glance behind as he stepped on to the coliseum track and Treacy could see Spedding closing in. “And John Treacy appears in the stadium”, “He’s very tired”, “He’s tired but he’s great and he’s good, and he’s hanging on”. What was required was a final kick and typical of the tenacity, the courage and the fight of Treacy, he produced exactly what was needed.

“The crowd stands for the Irishman from Villierstown in Waterford. My fellow commentators are on their feet. It is quite remarkable. The little man with the great heart.”

Tadhg Crowley

At the start of the 20th century one of the world’s leading athletes was an Irishman named Peter O’Connor. O’Connor was a prolific jumper who won National titles in Long Jump, High Jump and Triple Jump (Hop, Step and Jump as it was known at the time). He won Olympic Gold and Silver in 1906 and set a long jump world record that stood for 20 years and an Irish record that was unbeaten for an extraordinary 89 years!

Born in Cumberland in the North of England in 1872 to Irish parents, O’Connor’s family returned to their native Wicklow shortly after his birth. One of eleven children his parents were unable to afford to send O’Connor to Secondary School and so he set off to Galway to pursue a career as a solicitor’s clerk. It was here that Peter O’Connor first became involved in athletics, quickly finding success when representing his club in Clifden.

Towards the end of the 19th century, organised sporting events were beginning to grow in popularity. Huge crowds would attend GAA matches and athletics meets, where people soaked up the atmosphere and celebrated Ireland’s finest. A staunch nationalist, O’Connor became involved with the GAA and saw how sport could be a vehicle for national expression, a way to positively promote Irish identity. Politics were to play a key role in O’Connor’s athletics career even from these early days competing in the West of Ireland.

In 1898, Mayo athlete Walter Newburn set a Long Jump World Record and ignited a rivalry with O’Connor which would shape their careers for the subsequent years. O’Connor had outjumped Newburn on several occasions but always fallen foul to disqualification on technical grounds. O’Connor believed the Irish Amateur Athletic Association, a known unionist organisation, were favouring fellow unionist Newburn and instructing their judges to rule against him.

In 1899, Peter O’Connor at the age of 25 won the first of his All-Ireland titles, claiming Gold in the Long Jump, High Jump and Triple Jump. This achievement and his domination of British athletes at every meet he attended led to him being selected to represent Britain at the 1900 Olympics in Paris. O’Connor refused the call-up stating he wished to represent Ireland and only Ireland.

O’Connor’s relationship with the IAAA deteriorate, he decided to split from the organisation and only compete in the AAA British Championships. He won every AAA Championship Long Jump title between 1901 and 1906 and AAA High Jump titles in 1903 and 1904. After again refusing a callup by the British Olympic Council in 1904, Peter O’Connor, Con Leahy, and John Daly were nominated for the 1906 Olympics by the GAA and the IAAA. Dressed in green blazers and shamrock-emblazoned caps, the trio set off for Athens to be the first team to represent Ireland at an international event. On board the passenger boat to Greece, the athletes discovered that the Irish team would not be recognized, as Ireland did not have an Olympic Council, and instead O’Connor, Leahy and Daly would be competing for Britain.

By the 1906 Olympics, O’Connor was past his prime yet such was his class he won gold in the triple jump, at 34 the oldest ever gold-medal winner in this event, before winning silver in the long jump. O’Connor’s closest competitor in the long jump was the world famous U.S. athlete Myer Prinstein. Before the competition commenced it was announced that the sole judge would be Matthew Halpin, the American Team Manager. O’Connor voiced his disapproval but to no avail. O’Connor, just like in his early days competing in Connaught, felt he was unjustly treated and in the end, inevitably Prinstein was declared the winner.

The Irish athletes brought with them on their travels to Athens an Irish flag, the old 'Erin Go Bragh' (Ireland for ever) flag with a golden harp showing on a green background. At the Long Jump medal ceremony, O’Connor saw his chance to stage a protest at having to compete as part of the British team. He used his athletic prowess to scale a 20-foot flagpole and replaced the British flag with the green Irish flag. As the 55,000 spectators looked on, O’Connor waved the flag and his teammates and a number of Irish American athletes held off the officials who were attempting to scale the pole after him. It was the first moment in modern Olympic history where we see an act of political protest. O’Connor’s career faded out after this moment, fitting though for an athlete whose career was so interwoven with nationalism, politics and protest that is last act would be one of defiance.

 Tadhg Crowley

Merlene Ottey, Queen of the Track or The Bronze Queen (because of the number of 3rd place finishes she had at major championships), had an elite level sprinting career that spanned five decades and saw her win 9 Olympic medals and 14 World Championship medals. Ottey’s incredible journey which began with a successful collegiate career in the late 1970s and early 1980s and concluded with her representing Slovenia at the European Championships in 2012 aged 52, had many moments of celebration but was not without controversy.

Born in the small village of Cold Spring on the northwest tip of Jamaica in 1960, Merlene Ottey found an interest in athletics at an early age. Rural life in Jamaica in the 1960s was tough, her village had no running water, electricity or telephones. Her youth was spent outdoors playing games, running barefoot to school and when the opportunity arose competing in local races. By her mid-teens, Ottey began to consider track more seriously. She looked at the achievements of Don Quarrie, the 1970s Jamaican sprint star, and dreamed of replicating his Olympic successes. By 1978, she was representing her country and a year later claiming her first major senior medal, a bronze in the 200m at the 1979 Pan American Games in Puerto Rico.

Ottey’s status rose to a new level after her move to the University of Nebraska in the US mid-west where she took the collegiate circuit by storm. Her 4 years at the university saw her win 14 individual national titles and 24 All-American awards. Ottey is still the only athlete, male or female, in the history of the NCAA track and field championships to score in the 100m, 200m and 400m in the same meet, the 1983 NCAA Outdoor Championships.

Merlene Ottey’s first Olympic games in Moscow 1980 yielded a bronze medal in the 200m. This performance meant Ottey was the first female Jamaican athlete to win an Olympic medal. She returned home to a hero’s welcome and was awarded Officer of the Order of Nation and the Order of Distinction both for her contributions to Jamaican sport. Success after success followed for Ottey, with double bronze at the 1984 LA Olympics (100m & 200m), and the 1987 Rome World Championships (100m & 200m), and a further two bronze medals (100m & 200m) with a 4 x 100m relay gold at the 1991 Tokyo World Championships particularly notable performances.

An athlete in her prime with all the experience in the world, the 1992 Barcelona Olympics were set for Ottey to finally move up the podium. Prior to the Games, Ottey suffered with anaemia, which many attribute to her underperforming. However, she still managed to win her way through the 200m heats and claim another bronze medal. Ottey overcame the disappointment of Barcelona, by setting a World Indoor 200m Record in early 1993. This the perfect preparation for the Stuttgart World Championships which saw Ottey involved in two photo finishes. Out dipped by Gail Devers in the 100m but holding off Gwen Torrence in one of the all-time classic 200m races. A blistering start by Ottey saw her 2 metres clear at the curve but as the line approached Ottey tightened, feeling her hamstring and the Olympic champion closed. Ottey stumbled forward with the line arriving just in time. The official decision took an age but finally Ottey was announced the winner and had her first major individual outdoor gold. Ottey did move up the Olympic podium too at the 1996 Atlanta games, winning silver in the 100m behind long-time rival Gail Devers, and silver in the 200m behind France’s Marie-José Pérec.

Merlene Ottey was voted Jamaican Sportswoman of the Year 15 times between 1979 and 1997. In 1998, Ottey made the decision to move to Slovenia to train under coach Srđan Đorđević, where she preferred the support structure and treatment options for her ongoing injuries. After an athletics event in Lucerne, Switzerland in 1999, Ottey returned a positive sample for the banned anabolic steroid nandrolone. Her ‘B’ sample was also returned positive and Ottey was banned for two years. Proclaiming her innocence, Ottey said she was the victim of a “terrible mistake”, and that "I live my personal and athletic life with the utmost honesty and integrity.” The Jamaican Amateur Athletics Association cleared Ottey of illegal use of drugs in November of 1999 citing a faulty test. The IAAF subsequently lifted their ban after the case was thrown out by The Court of Arbitration for Sport, the retesting had not taken place within the allotted timeframe. Ottey was again free to compete and was eyeing up the Sydney Olympics, although now with a cloud of controversy hanging over her.

No doubt affected by the ongoing saga and without a clean block of training, Merlene Ottey floundered at the Jamaican Trials, finishing 4th in the 100m. Selection for the Olympics was on the basis of the performances at the trials and the top three were selected to compete in Sydney. Ottey requested that she be included in the team at the expense of another. A request granted by the Jamaican AAA with Peta-Gaye Dowdie the unfortunate athlete. The decision was not favoured by the Jamaican team who felt Dowdie was being mistreated, bullied out of her rightful place by an ageing athlete with a suspect past. The dispute came to a head when the Jamaican team threatened to boycott the relays and paraded through the Olympic village holding placards and shouting “Merlene out, out!!!”. The demonstration came on the same day that Germany's 1992 Olympic 5,000m champion Dieter Baumann was banned by the IAAA for two years after testing positive for the anabolic steroid nandrolone, the same drug found in Ottey's drug test the year before. The protests ended when the International Olympic Committee intimated that the whole Jamaican team would be expelled if they continued. Ottey finished 4th in the 100m final, a race won by Marion Jones. Ottey was later upgraded to the bronze position after Jones was stripped of her medals for using performance enhancing drugs.

Due to the controversy, Ottey decided that "after Sydney I said I wasn't going to run another race for Jamaica ... because I felt like the Jamaicans were trying to push me out of the sport and I really needed to prove my point, that I might be 40 but I can still run.”

In 2002, Merlene Ottey became a Slovene citizen and represented the country at the 2004 Olympics in Athens. At the age of 52, Ottey competed in her final major T&F championships running as part of the Slovenian 4 x 100m relay team at the 2012 European Championships in Helsinki.

A career of remarkable achievements, Merlene Ottey ran the 100m under 11 seconds a record 68 times, ran the 200m under 22 seconds a record 16 times, won 57 consecutive 100m races and holds the Master World Records over 100m and 200m in W35, W40, W45 and W50 categories. However, all these feats and more by the 1990 World Athlete of Year come with a large question mark. Do we celebrate the unprecedented achievements of Ottey or do we refrain from talking about her athletics career? It is a dilemma that faces Jamaican Track & Field, the relationship with her country of birth has never been the same since the 1999 drugs ban and ensuing dispute. Sadly, an athlete who should be adored as The Queen of Jamaican Track remains a divisive figure.

Tadhg Crowley

22 April 2023

One of the Great Flying Finns, Pavvo Nurmi has won more Athletics Olympic medals than any other athlete, nine gold and three silver. Five gold medals at the Paris Olympics alone. He was the first great superstar of athletics. A generational athlete who operated at a completely different level to his peers. 

Paavo Nurmi grew up in Turku in the southwest of Finland and began running at the age of ten. By eleven he was running the 1500m in a time of 5:02. During his childhood, Nurmi’s family endured a series of tragedies. Nurmi’s father died in 1910 and his sister a year later. At the age of 12, he left school to help provide for the family. His mother worked on a building site and Nurmi himself endeavoured to hold down various odd jobs, balancing this with minding his younger siblings. These commitments meant Nurmi had very little time for running until he joined the army years later. 

The difficult years undoubtedly had a profound effect on the young man and his approach to life. For one thing, Nurmi had developed a strength, a hardcore spirit, a determination born from years of hardship, hard labour and journeys trudging through snow, ice and freezing winds. When Nurmi was 15, Hannes Kolehmainen, the first Flying Finn took Gold at the Stockholm Olympics and catapulted athletics and long distance running to the forefront of Finnish culture. Nurmi saw in athletics a way out of the dire economic and social situation his family were in. 

Once in the army Nurmi was able to concentrate on building his fitness and focusing on his running. He was implementing training approaches and race strategies that moved beyond the amateur to a level of professionalism that had never been seen before. Performances in athletics at that time were dictated by talent alone, the plucky amateur was celebrated, and it was deemed too professional to concentrate your efforts on training. In this staunchly amateur era, someone who took this approach was seen as overstepping the mark, it was in fact largely considered to be cheating. However, Nurmi was keen to develop on the ‘approach’ of Kolehmainen and the wider Finnish distance running scene, which was breaking from the general amateur view, and like them he wanted to maximise his talent and find ways to train in a more professional way. 

Alongside his training base workouts, Nurmi used to wait until darkness to hit the streets of Turku, where he raced trams in an effort to build his mileage.  Long before the era of jogging arrived in the late 1960s/70s, it was pretty unusual to see a person running around a town or over country roads, in fact you would be considered rather odd if you ran anywhere.

Paavo Nurmi was incredibly methodical, he left nothing to chance. He trained and raced with a stopwatch in his hand and what was witnessed on race day had been repeated countless times in training. Although completely normal now, this approach was radical for its time. Famously he even replicated his Olympic 1500m, 5000m double run with the same time duration between efforts at the Finnish Olympic trials, while everyone predicted the feat to be impossible, Nurmi had already proved to himself that it was well within his capabilities, breaking the world record in both events. 

It was at the Paris Olympics in 1924 where Nurmi cemented his legacy. Between 8 July and the 13 July, Nurmi won five gold medals in the 1500m, 5000m, 3000m Team Race, Individual Cross Country and Team Cross Country. The 1500m and 5000m golds were won just 60 minutes apart, while the Cross Country victory, the last time the event was held at the Olympics, was particularly impressive. Ran during a heatwave where the temperatures soared to 45 degrees, just 15 of the 38-man field completed the race and 8 were carried away on stretchers at the end. The stories of the nearby factories that spewed poisonous gases, and the many tales of how athletes were severely affected by heat stroke add to the near mythical quality of the event. Nurmi won with 1 minute 24 seconds to spare over the silver medallist, and the British athlete Guy Butler wrote ‘Nurmi looked as fresh as if he’d just completed one of his training spins in the shade of the Finnish forests but others staggered to the finish’.  

Nurmi was an enigma, he shared very little, rarely spoke to press or mixed with fellow athletes. Many of his competitors were beaten before the starting gun had ever been fired. Nurmi’s stern expressionless face, his cold distant stare and robotically consistent laps, along with his supreme conditioning led to an air of invincibility. After the Olympics Nurmi travelled to the US where he ran 55 races, losing just once. It was a tour that is rumoured to have been very financially beneficial, though it would have been all brown envelopes and hushed exchanges during this amateur period.

Through his career, Nurmi set 22 world records and over his 14 years of running at the highest level he remained unbeaten at Cross-Country and over the 10,000m distance. Long before Eliud Kipchoge had declared ‘no human is limited’, Nurmi had questioned our limitations. In an interview shortly after his retirement where he reflected on his athletic career Nurmi stated that there were ‘neither unbeatable records nor human limits.’ That philosophy was one that perfectly epitomised the Great Flying Finn.

Tadhg Crowley

New Zealand’s history of producing elite middle distance runners is an impressive read, from the great Jack Lovelock in the 1930s, Peter Snell in the 1960s, John Walker in the 1970s and more recently Nick Willis in the 2000s, the black singlet and Olympic 1500m medals very often go hand in hand. Perhaps of all these great Kiwis, it is Peter Snell together with his coach Arthur Lydiard, who have had the most significant impact on the athletics world. Their partnership reached its pinnacle at the Tokyo Olympic Games in 1964 but their legacy can still be found in the training plans of every distance runner today.

Born in Opunake on New Zealand’s North Island in 1938, Peter Snell exceled at a wide range of sports from an early age. Needless to say, rugby was his main focus during High School, but he also played golf, cricket, badminton and hockey. During the summer season, Snell would turn his attention to tennis. In an endeavour to improve his fitness one Sunday (aged 19) he joined friend and prominent athlete Bill Bailey for a training run. Bailey was coached by Arthur Lydiard. While Snell was unable to complete this long run, Lydiard spotted his talent and convinced him that he could make him a champion if he followed his training programme. 

Lydiard’s coaching ideology centred on having his athletes build a strong endurance base by covering high mileage, 100 miles a week was optimum, and through the weekly long run of around 20 miles. He also introduced the concept of periodization, where training was adapted to the season and target races. All this is completely standard practice in endurance running today, but in the late 1950s and early 1960s it was a hugely innovative approach.

Snell burst on to the world stage at the 1960 Olympics in Rome, surprising everyone including world record holder Roger Moens (Belgium), to win Gold in the 800m. Only running under Lydiard’s direction for two years, there was nobody more surprised than Snell himself, “It was hard to believe that suddenly I was an Olympic champion. I recall looking up to the giant results board above the track and seeing P G Snell NZL at the top of the list. That was one of the great thrills of my life.”

After his success in Rome, Snell began to set his sights on world records. Breaking the mile and half mile records within a week of each other. In total, Snell set six world records, five individual and one with a New Zealand 4 x 1 mile relay team. That relay record has been held for the past 37 years by Ireland’s fabulous four – Eamonn Coghlan, Marcus O’Sullivan, Frank O’Mara and Ray Flynn. 

At the Olympic Games in Tokyo 1964 Peter Snell was particularly dominant. The New Zealand flag bearer entered the games in a very different position than four years earlier, now as world record holder over mile, half-mile and 800m, he was the clear favourite. The expectations were there from his nation, the running world but also from himself, Snell was streets ahead of his competitors and he knew it. In the 800m final, his superiority was evident, Snell boxed in allowed the entire field to pass him by before smoothly moving around the outside and sprinting away to victory. In the 1500m final, Snell as identifiable for his strength as he was for his all-black racing gear, showcased his class again sprinting clear of the field to win comfortably by several yards. The 800m – 1500m double had not been achieved by a male athlete since Great Britain’s Albert Hill in 1920. It is a feat that has yet to be repeated.

Just as quickly as he appeared on to the world scene, Snell’s athletic career came to an abrupt end. At the end of the 1965 track season after a series of poor results, Snell announced his retirement at the age of 27. Although Snell’s career at the top level was relatively brief his influence has been enduring. He went on to a successful career as a researcher in the US but always kept on running.

“Running cleared the day's cobwebs from my mind and focused my thinking, and gave me time and space to sort out anything that was bothering me, or to detach and think of nothing at all. When it's pouring rain and you're bowling along through the wet, there's satisfaction in knowing you're out there and the others aren't.”

Tadhg Crowley

The Millennium Olympics saw the participation of 199 countries across 300 events with the awarding of 2280 medals, yet the Games belonged to one athlete, the Australian superstar Cathy Freeman. From the Opening Ceremony at Stadium Australia where she was the final torchbearer, to the 400m Women’s Final in front of a packed stadium and with the expectations of a nation on her shoulders, Freeman appeared in her rightful place, creating magic moments and securing her place in Olympic history. 

Catherine Astrid Salome Freeman was born in Mackay, Queensland on 16 February, 1973. Freeman’s mother of Kuku Yalanji heritage was born in Palm Island while her father was born of the Burri Gubba people of central Queensland. Cathy became involved in athletics at a young age and by fourteen, she declared to her vocational officer that her only career goal was to win an Olympic medal. At this stage, the goal wasn’t completely unfeasible, she had won national titles in high jump, and the 100, 200 and 400 metre sprints. At 16 years of age, Freeman won gold at the 1990 Auckland Commonwealth Games as part of the 4x100m relay team, and at the 1992 Barcelona Olympics she became the first Aboriginal track and field athlete to represent Australia at an Olympic Games.

During the 1994 Commonwealth Games Freeman caused controversy by carrying the Aboriginal flag as well as the Australian national flag during her victory lap of the 200 metres sprint. At that time the Aboriginal flag was not recognised as an official Australian flag. Many deemed the act too ‘political’ and this was further pushed by Australia’s Chef de Mission for the games, Arthur Tunstall, who issued a statement in which he publicly reprimanded Freeman stating ‘She should have carried the Australian flag first up, and (we should have) not seen the Aboriginal flag at all’.

Others however saw it as an act of reconciliation and celebrated the moment. Freeman was keenly aware of the many injustices done to Aboriginal people. Her own grandmother had been part of the stolen generations, forcibly taken away from her family at the age of eight. In her biography, Cathy: Her Own Story, Freeman stated that ‘I wanted to shout, ‘Look at me. Look at my skin. I’m black, and I’m the best.’ There was no more shame’.

Freeman entered the Sydney Games as favourite, and comfortably won the three preliminary heats. For the final she wore her Nike Swift Suit, a green, gold and silver full aerodynamic bodysuit with hood. The suit making Freeman easily identifiable amongst the field not that she required any more attentionon her! At the previous Olympic Games, in Atlanta in 1996, Freeman had won silver, narrowly coming in second to French athlete Marie-José Pérec. The world was hoping that Sydney would bring a rematch of that encounter. But, to Freeman’s disappointment, Pérec pulled out a few days before the race, citing the pressure of competing against a hometown favourite.

At 8:10pm on Monday 25th September silence engulfed the Olympic stadium. After an excruciatingly long pause, the starter shouted “set”, and the gun blasted. As Freeman rose so too did the 112,000 spectators, both athlete and audience roaring into life! Freeman started fast and as she entered the back straight you can see her trying to hold herself back, the adrenaline must have been soaring through her veins, she steadies to find her form. The noise inside the stadium deafening. With 200m to go, there was nothing between Freeman and the second and third placed athletes, Lorraine Graham (Jamaica) and Katharine Merry (Great Britain). They rounded the final bend and into the home straight still neck and neck. Then with 50m to go Freeman moved up a gear and sprinted clear to claim a historic gold with 3 metres to spare on Graham in second. 

Freeman had fulfilled a mission that had absorbed her whole life: she had won the 400m final (49.11), and claimed Australia’s 100th gold medal. Not since 1964, when Betty Cuthbert was successful over the same distance in Tokyo, had an Australian woman won a flat race on the track at the Games. And yet of all this drama and excitement what came next was possibly most significant. Dancing her victory lap in front of an ecstatic home crowd, Freeman carried both Australian and Aboriginal flags. She carefully picked them up at the same time, and tied their ends together, to show that they were equally important to her. After all the controversy of the Commonwealth Games in 1994, this time Freeman’s flag carrying was seen as a moment for the nation, symbolising the Australian people’s desire for reconciliation and pride in her Aboriginal cultural heritage.

Tadhg Crowley

Pre…Pre…Pre…

The chant that rung around the Hayward Field in Eugene, Oregon throughout the late ‘60s and early ‘70s was for the American track icon Steve Prefontaine. At the tender age of 19 Pre was on the cover of Sports Illustrated, and in an era when Track and Field was the second most popular sport in the US, Steve Prefontaine was a rock star. The mecca of track was the Hayward Field and Pre’s races would attract up to 25,000 adoring fans. 

Pre…Pre…Pre…

Pre was different. That seems to be the consensus amongst those who knew the charismatic young Coos Bay native. Brimming with confidence, wit and style, everyone was a fan of the most quotable athlete the world has ever encountered. Pre’s post-race interviews were often as entertaining as the race. “No matter how hard you train, Somebody will train harder. No matter how hard you run, Somebody will run harder. No matter how much you want it, Somebody will want it more. I am Somebody."

Pre…Pre…Pre…

Perhaps of all of Pre’s characteristics it was his stubbornness that may have shaped him most. Considered two small for football in High School, Pre found in running a way to beat the big guys, and to put his stamp on the world. From an early age, Pre would refuse to be beaten. Instead, he would quickly take the lead in races and was happy operating on the red line where a blow up was always a possibility. He famously said, “The best pace is a suicide pace, and today is a good day to die!” However, Pre soon found that the only place he was comfortable was at the front and he honed his ability to front race and control the tempo.

Pre…Pre…Pre…

The 1972 Olympics in Munich was set up for Pre to sprinkle his stardust on the world. At the age of 21 Pre was still a novice in terms of international racing. The vast majority of his track experiences taking place on the collegiate circle or in other US based meets. But such was his confidence Pre was sure that he would be able to bring a surprise element to the Games which would catch the dominant European runners off guard. The ’72 Olympics were overshadowed by the tragic events that took place in the athlete village on the eve of the games. Pre like so many others was deeply affected. Convinced by Coach Bowerman that participation was the only action, he attempted to remain focused. Often nominated as one of the best Olympic finals, the 5,000m pitched the outspoken Prefontaine against the Finn Lasse Viren. The race opened with an excruciatingly slow first two miles before Pre took control of the pace as they entered the last mile. A sprint finish was not in Pre’s interests, he needed to burn off the competition. This long drive for home was an approach that Viren would often take himself and he sat in behind Pre and let the young American do the work. Halfway through the penultimate lap, Pre quickened the pace again, and together with Viren, the World Record holder and 10000m Gold medallist, and the Tunisian Mohammed Gammoudi, they broke free from the rest. At the bell, Viren surged to the front. The next few hundred metres epitomise Pre. Another athlete would have covered the move but protected their own bronze medal position. Instead, Pre continued to surge forward. With 200m to go, Pre made his final move which was matched by Gammoudi before Viren glided past both athletes showing his class to stride away to victory. Pre was visibly faltering, as he entered the last 80m, he appeared to be running in treacle, and the fast-finishing Ian Stewart caught Pre just before the line. 4th place. Pre's desire to always win, to think of anything other than Gold as a failure, depriving the young American of an Olympic medal. After initial disappointment, Pre’s attentions quickly turned to Montreal in ’76 and a chance for redemption.

Pre…Pre…Pre…

Just like Hendrix, Cobain, and other superstar rock stars, Pre’s life was tragically cut short. On his way home from a party in May '75, Pre’s car crossed the road, flipped and hit a wall. At the time of his death, aged 24, Pre held every US outdoor track record from 2km to 10km.

Pre…Pre…Pre…

“For of all sad words of tongue and pen, The saddest are these: It might have been.”, John Greenleaf Whittier. 

Tadhg Crowley

Bob Beamon collapsed to his knees, his hands clung to his face as he curled up on the track, teammates and officials trying to prise him to his feet. Beamon had suffered a brief cataplexy attack, his legs giving way and paralysing his muscles. The attack was brought on by a wave of emotion as he realised what he had achieved. Beamon had produced a jump for the ages. He had not just broken the Long Jump World Record; he had completely obliterated it. By producing a jump of 8.90m, he had bettered the existing record by 55cm. It was a record that would stand for 23 years.

The U.S. Long Jumper Bob Beamon undoubtedly entered the 1968 Mexico City Olympics as one of the favourites. His pre-games form seeing him win 22 of 23 events. The competition for Gold included Beamon’s friend, mentor and U.S. teammate, the 1960 Gold medallist and joint world record holder, Ralf Boston, and the Soviet Union sensation, the athlete whom Boston shared the World Record, Igor Ter-Ovanesyan. However, Beamon’s qualifying did not go smoothly and after two fouls, a final jump of 8.19m saw him make the final. The expectations on the 22-year-old Beamon’s shoulders had led to a nervousness and anxiety that he had rarely felt in his career. Advice from Ralf Boston had helped him through the qualifying round, but he couldn’t expect the same in the final.

The pressure mounted for Beamon and the night before the final he decided to hit the town for a drink to calm the nerves. Although, Beamon’s misadventures have probably been exaggerated somewhat with the passing of time, his own account of events in his 1999 biography ‘The Man Who Could Fly’, describes how he went out and had a few shots of tequila. He later admitted he ‘had committed the cardinal sin in sports,’ by not preparing correctly for the moment in his life he worked so hard for. The next day Beamon cast aside any guilt and decided to get down to business.

At 3:45pm on Friday 18th October 1968, Bob Beamon stood at the runway before his first jump in the Long Jump final. Looking relaxed, Beamon took long deep breaths. The conditions were perfect with the wind speed just inside the legal limit. Beamon’s smooth, easy style run disguised the pace at which he was moving. He hit the board perfectly and took off through the air, landing in a forward momentum that ensured he did not fall back into the sand. Just 6 seconds had passed from take-off to landing.

Beamon knew it was long, the adrenalin was flowing as he bounced out of and around the pit, skipping away confidently to wait for the measurement. Five minutes passed and the judges still deliberated. Ten minutes and still no word. Then fifteen minutes after Beamon’s jump, the officials called for a manual tape. This looked promising for Beamon and he felt he had the World Record, his teammate Boston let him know it was long. Finally, the scoreboard flashed up 8.90m New WR but Beamon worked with non-metric measurements so he still didn’t know how far he had jumped. “29 feet 2.5 inches Bob”, Beamon raced around uncontrollably before collapsing on the track, all his life’s efforts culminating at the biggest stage in the most dramatic fashion. Gold a certainty and legendary status assured.

Tadhg Crowley

The greatest female athlete of the 20th century (as voted by the the International Association of Athletics Federations) came to the fore when the world most needed a champion to cheer. After a 12-year hiatus caused by the Second World War, the Olympic Games returned in 1948 and a war torn London still reeling from years of tragedy, hardship and rationing was the host city. 

 The ’48 Olympics produced the most vivacious atmosphere such was the appetite for sporting competition, positive spectacle and celebration. This unrivalled emotional state reached its height on the 7th August when the 80,000 people inside Wembley Stadium rose for the 4 x 100m relay finals to see Fanny Blankers-Koen dominate the final leg. Receiving the baton in 3rd place, the Dutch star showcased her incredible speed to overhaul the Canadian and Australian runners and secure victory. This Gold medal was Blankers-Koen’s fourth of the games, the first time a female athlete had won four Gold medals, and Blankers-Koen had achieved the feat in the one Olympics. 

 Few, if any, of the spectators wildly cheering from the stands on that Saturday afternoon would have known that Fanny Blankers-Koen’s preparations for the games had been greatly disrupted. She had only been able to train twice a week in the months leading up to August. The reason, Blankers-Koen had endured a summer of sickness that came with her third pregnancy. She was 3 months pregnant by the time the games commenced. 

 Born in Utrecht in 1918, Fanny Blankers-Koen demonstrated her athletic prowess across a range of sports from an early age. At the age of 18, she qualified for the 1936 Olympics in the High Jump and 4 x 100m relay. A fifth place finish in both events pointed towards the all-round talent of the young athlete. In the subsequent years, Blankers-Koen rose to the top of her sport. A World Record in the 100m, was followed by European Bronze medals in the 100m and 200m. During the war years, Blankers-Koen was confined to domestic competition and in these her prime years she set 6 new World Records across the 100m, 80m Hurdles, Long Jump and High Jump.

 At the ’48 games, Blankers-Koen was 30 years old and had two children. She had defied expectations by continuing as an athlete after giving birth to son in 1942. At that time it was deemed implausible that a mother could compete as an athlete, and there were even very few married female athletes competing. Blankers-Koen with the support of her husband and coach Jan Blankers, was breaking the mould. Her actions did not go unnoticed and led to strong public opinions fuelled by sexist commentary in the press. It is hard to understate the importance of a female athlete shining through at this moment in history and particularly in an era when female sports were judged so secondary. 

 Blankers-Koen began the ’48 Olympics with Gold in the 100m, on a muddy wet track, dressed in a distinguished white t-shirt and bright orange shorts, she cruised to victory in a new Olympic Record. Two days later, Blankers-Koen took her second Gold in the 80m Hurdles, despite a slow start and clipping a hurdle, she recovered to stride to victory setting another Olympic Record. Weather conditions worsened by Friday 6thAugust and the 200m final, but the visibly heavy track had no effect on Blankers-Koen who raced to Gold with daylight between her and the rest of the field. Her winning margin the largest in Olympic 200m history. 

 Rules at the ’48 Games stated that female athletes were only allowed to enter 3 individual T&F events. This most likely wasn’t a huge issue for the majority of competitors travelling to London, however considering Blankers-Koen was the World Record holder in the High Jump and Long Jump, as well as being an extremely accomplished Shot Putter, one can only speculate on how many Golds she could have won had there been no restrictions on female athletes. 

 Blankers-Koen returned to the Netherlands a hero, a horse drawn carriage brought her through the adoring crowds in Amsterdam and Queen Juliana made her a knight of the Order of Orange Nassau (the Dutch Order of Chivalry). 

And what of Ireland at the ’48 Olympics, well we did win one medal. 69 year old Meath native Letitia Marion Hamilton won Bronze in the Olympic Art Competition for her painting of a Point-to-Point Race.

Tadhg Crowley

There are few athletes to have left such an extraordinary impression on the sport as that of legendary British marathoner Ron Hill. From his racing days stacked with world records to his post-race career with Ron Hill Sports and his substantial writing on training and racing, Hill has influenced a generation of runners across all levels. 

Born in Lancashire in 1938, Ron Hill ran for the Bolton United & Harriers Athletics Club. After winning a scholarship to Manchester University, he studied Textile Chemistry and eventually completed a PhD in the field in 1964. Hill’s athletic career began on the track where he found much success over the 10km distance. His passion for racing brought him across the UK, as he searched out races of all distances to satisfy his appetite for competition. Hill was a firm believer that a race setting was the best environment to build fitness and learn tactics.

A shortage of races on a Saturday in August 1961 led the young Ron Hill to Liverpool for the Liverpool City Marathon. He had never run the distance before but thought it would be a worthwhile challenge. Standing on the start line of this his first marathon, taking place around the streets of Liverpool, he was joined by only 37 other runners. After 10 miles, Hill and the Ghost Runner John Tarrant pulled away from the field. The pair fought it out for the next number of miles before Hill put in a surge and raced away to victory in a time of 2:24:22. Immediately after he swore, like every other runner, that he’d never race the distance again but a big write up on his success in the Guardian newspaper the following Monday changed his mind and thus his marathon career was launched.

Marathon racing in the 50s and 60s wasn’t like we know it now. Drinks were not allowed until the 10-mile marker and only again at every 5-mile marker after. In the main, the leading competitors did not fuel or take fluids at all. Later in life, Hill explained his hydration approach to the European Championships marathon in Athens ’69 in the blistering heat. “The tar was melting on the road, a really hot day. I didn’t want to take the drinks they were handing out along the route as I might swallow air, I decided I wouldn’t drink during the race at all. So, I got a pint bottle of pop and put salt in it, drank it down and said, ‘right that’s it now, get on with the race’.”

Most athletes didn’t run wearing a watch either, as the designs in those days were quite heavy and cumbersome. Instead as Hill described athletes went hard from the gun and whoever survived won the race. This ‘eyeballs out’ approach, as Hill referred to it, was evident in one of his most successful days, when he won Marathon Gold at the Commonwealth Games in Edinburgh. On that day, Hill passed through the 10-mile mark in just over 47 minutes! He slowed but still finished in a World Record time of 2:09:28. 

An innovator in terms of sports clothing, he also experimented with his training and nutrition. A radical approach to his pre-race fuelling at the ’72 Munich Olympics may have deprived him of a medal. However, Hill had many other days of huge success. Notably in 1970, he became the first British runner to win the famous Boston Marathon while breaking the course record. Over his career Hill ran 115 marathons, including 19 in one calendar year alone. He set world records over distances from 10 miles to the marathon. And one of his numerous records remains intact today. 

19,032. That’s the number of consecutive days that Ron Hill ran. The longest running streak in history spread over 52 years from 1964 to 2017. This streak included 26.2 years of doubles i.e., Ron Hill ran twice a day for over 26 years! When he realised, he could no longer keep up the twice a day runs he decided to conclude them at a number most relevant to his career. Hill’s streak began after he was disappointed with a race performance, and he made the decision to increase his mileage and not take days off. In an era where athletics was a steadfast amateur sport, Hill had to hold down a job while training to win major championships. He did this by running to and from work, incorporating speed sessions and longer runs into his evening commute home. Hill’s streak withstood many the close call, including a car crash in 1993 where he broke his sternum, and foot surgery the same year. In 2017, the streak came to an end. After running over a mile where he was experiencing excruciating chest pains, Ron Hill decided to take a day off.  

Tadhg Crowley

Ron Clarke’s invitation to participate in an athletics meeting in Prague in June 1966 was succeeded by a day of sightseeing and hospitality with the great Czech athlete Emil Zatopek as his guide. Zatopek had long been an admirer of the younger Australian and had followed his career closely. As the day wound down, Zatopek escorted Clarke through airport security and up the steps to his awaiting plane. The two exchanged farewells and Zatopek slipped a small parcel into Clarke’s hands before hastily turning and making his way off the flight. When Clarke eventually worked up the courage to open the package, he had initially thought it was either contraband or a message to the outside world from the then Soviet controlled state, he found an Olympic Gold medal. It was the Olympic Gold that Zatopek had won for the 10,000m in 1952. The medal had been newly inscribed ‘To Ron Clarke, Not out of friendship, but because you deserve it’. That act of incredible altruism begins to give us an insight into just how remarkable a person Emil Zatopek was. But what of Zatopek the athlete.

The rolling head with tongue dangling, wheezing heavily as he swayed side to side, Zatopek’s running style was as ungainly as it was distinct. Part of what made Zatopek a crowd favourite must have been this style though. We are so accustomed to the graceful effortless strides of champions, what the crowds saw with Zatopek was closer to the gallant efforts of a plucky underdog, his tortured expression always causing a stir and generating conversations. Looking back on the old footage it is clear to see that Zatopek is giving everything and how could you not root for someone like this. Zatopek once commented that he didn’t have the ability to smile and run at the same time so what you saw was him concentrating solely on going fast. And Zatopek could move, setting an incredible 18 world records over his career.

His crowning moment came at the ’52 Olympic games in Helsinki when he achieved a feat that surely will never be repeated. Zatopek won Gold in the 5,000m, 10,000m and Marathon, breaking the Olympic record in each event. 

Zatopek was an innovator. His training equal parts impressive and bizarre. He would go to extreme lengths to improve his performance, everything from interval sessions that would last hours (famously 100 x 400m reps in a single session) to training in heavy boots, sprinting while holding his breath and running in the pitch dark. Zatopek brought a different level of commitment and dedication to the sport during the 40s and 50s and this matched with his undoubted talent led to incredible success. 

Zatopek’s decision to enter the ’52 Olympic Marathon was only made a couple of days beforehand. He had never previously run the distance competitively and wasn’t considered one of the pre-race favourites. That accolade fell with British athlete Jim Peters. Peters had broken the Marathon World Record four times in the previous years and was hotly tipped for the gold. With no experience of the marathon, Zatopek’s approach was to closely track Peters and let the race unfold. At the start line, Zatopek approached Peters to introduce himself, exclaiming ‘I am Zatopek’, Peters was aware of who the legendary Zatopek was and had only moved to the marathon distance having watched the Czech athlete dominate his preferred 10,000 distance for years. He didn’t engage him in conversation rather just returning a polite but curt ‘nice to meet you’.  As the race developed Peters, Zatopek and the Swede Gustaf Jansson took the lead. After moving through halfway, Zatopek strode up alongside Peters and asked him, ‘are you sure we’re going fast enough?’ This comment riled the British athlete who took off at pace, but unable to sustain the speed Peters faded and eventually collapsed at the side of the road by the time he had made it to 20 miles. Zatopek went from strength to strength and finished out the miles laughing and joking with onlookers before finishing in a time of 2 hours 23 minutes and 3 seconds.

Zatopek was highly regarded by his peers, well except perhaps by Jim Peters. He would often joke and make conversation with fellow athletes during races. He was not only the centre of attention in every race because he would be in leading contention but also for his style and personality. The French athlete Alain Mimoun was often described as Zatopek’s shadow throughout his career having finished second to the Czech on numerous occasions including at the Olympics and Europeans. By the ’56 Olympics in Melbourne Zatopek was past his best and went into the games injured. This was Mimoun’s chance. And the French athlete strode to victory in the Marathon, 1 minute 30 seconds ahead of Yugoslav Franjo Mihalic in second and over 4 mins ahead of Zatopek in 6th. At the finish line Mimoun ran to Zatopek shouting ‘I won’, ‘I won’. Zatopek strewn on the ground in complete exhaustion, dragged himself up, removed his cap and gave Mimoun his finest military salute. This Mimoun later reflected was the single greatest moment in his athletic career, not winning the Gold medal but rather a salute from the greatest. 

Tadhg Crowley

14/8/22

The 1960 Olympic Games in Rome were the first to be televised in the United States and through the snowy black and white pictures a shining star emerged. This star was a young Tennessee athlete named Wilma Rudolph who would win the hearts and minds of her nation with a series of blistering performances on the track. 

Wilma Rudolph’s story reads like the script of a far-fetched Hollywood movie. Born prematurely as the 20th of 22 children, Rudolph suffered with ill health throughout her early years. At the age of 5, she contracted infantile paralysis caused by polio and lost the use of her left leg. Despite a prognosis from her doctor that she would never walk again, her family were defiant. Her mother escorted her on weekly 50 mile round trips to get specialist care while her many siblings took turns at administering basic massage at least 4 times a day. By the time she was 12 years old, Rudolph was walking unaided and soon after was beginning to showcase her sporting prowess. It was while breaking records on the basketball court for her high school, that Rudolph was spotted by the legendary track coach Ed Temple and thus began her incredible journey. Rudolph was nicknamed ‘skeeter’ in high school because of the speed at which she moved. Even competing against the world’s best at the Stadio Olympico in 1960, she appears to move effortlessly, and at a completely different speed to her competitors.

The 1960 Olympics were not Rudolph’s first, at the age of 16, she qualified for the 1956 Olympics in Melbourne. Rudolph competed in the 200m but was eliminated in the early rounds. However, as part of the 4 x 100m US relay team she secured a Bronze medal. Quite incredible to think that in 4 years, Rudolph had gone from being unable to walk to running at an Olympics and winning a Bronze medal.

Shortly after returning from the 1956 Olympics, Wilma Rudolph became pregnant with her first child Yolanda. Coach Ed Temple had a strict code of conduct for his track team and his rules excluded mothers from participating. Temple made an exception for Rudolph but only on the condition she did not have contact with her daughter or boyfriend. Yolanda was sent to live with Rudolph’s sister. 

Driven on by the extreme sacrifices she was making, Rudolph trained relentlessly. This relentless determination is a recurring theme in Wilma Rudolph’s story. 

At the Rome Olympics, Rudolph secured her place as the world’s fastest woman and became the first American woman to win three Gold medals at the one games. She was an instant star winning the 100m, 200m, and alongside Ed Temple’s other Tennessee Tigerbelles, the 4 x 100m. In the 100m, Rudolph equalled the World Record in the semi finals with a time of 11.3sec and comfortably won the final in a time of 11.0sec, a 2.75m/s tailwind prevented that time from being recognized as a WR. The sight of Rudolph striding well clear of the rest of the field became some of the defining images of the ‘60 games. In the opening heat of the 200m heats, Rudolph broke the Olympic record with a run of 23.2sec. She went on to win the Final from lane 1 with daylight between her and German athlete Jutta Heine in second. Rudolph ran the anchor leg of the 4 x 100m, overcoming an uncomfortable baton exchange to pass the German athlete and secure the Gold. 

After a tour of European track meets, Rudolph returned home to the US and to celebrations in her honour. ‘Welcome Wilma Day’ was organised as a day of festivities by her hometown Clarksville but Wilma only agreed to attend after assurances were given that the event would not be segregated. It became the first fully integrated event in the city’s history. This ability to force such change demonstrates Rudolph’s stardom. Many consider this act of defiance by Rudolph in forcing positive change in her city as her greatest feat. Rudolph retired at the age of 22, focusing on a career in teaching and coaching that was punctuated by periods of advocacy, media and consultancy. Wilma Rudolph died in 1994 at the age of 54, her legacy ensured as one of athletics all time greats. 

Tadhg Crowley

1/7/2022

On the 5 August 1984, the inaugural Women’s Olympic Marathon took place in Los Angeles. As the lead pack arrived at the 3 mile water station, US competitor Joan Benoit made her move. The temperatures on that first Sunday of the games ranged from between 20º  and 30º with high humidity. The favourites in the lead pack which included legendary Norwegian Grete Waitz and Portuguese Rosa Mota watched Benoit stride off into the distance confident that the searing Californian heat would take its toll and she would come back to them as the race unfolded.

Benoit had used this tactic before, most notably a year earlier at the 1983 Boston Marathon. Grete Waitz had just set a new Marathon World Record and Benoit was keen to take it back. In Boston, however Benoit did not wait for the 3rd mile, she took off at 4:47/mile pace and went through the 10 mile marker in 51:38 (still the 2nd fastest 10 mile by a US woman) and was through halfway in 1:08:23. The half marathon time would have been a World Record but it and the 10 mile time were not officially recognised. Benoit did slow but still shattered the Marathon World Record by 2min 47 sec. She would later describe her approach to running, ‘I go hard until something stops me.’

As Joan Benoit approached the LA Coliseum (the finishing point of the Olympic race) her image flashed up on the giant screen inside the stadium. Seeing the US singlet, the crowd erupted. Benoit was expecting that the stadium might have 4000-5000 spectators, it being the first weekend of the games and a Sunday morning. Down and through the famous tunnel, Benoit ran towards the ever increasing cacophony.

It was a long journey to the women’s marathon in LA. A journey that was made possible by pioneers such as Violet Piercy, Katherine Switzer, Adrienne Beames, and Jaqueline Hansen. The inclusion of the marathon came about after significant lobbying from the International Runners Committee and financial support from Nike. As of the 1980 Moscow Olympics, the 1500m was the longest race distance for female athletes. The lobbying groups had hoped that a 3,000m race may be included in 1984 with 5,000, 10,000 and marathon distances possible in future Olympics. However, the success of the Avon Marathon series as well as the IAAF sanctioned marathons, growing participation in distance running and the influence of Katherine Switzer among others, the IOC decided to approve the Marathon for LA 1984.

It wasn’t exactly a straightforward route to the LA marathon for Benoit either. A recurring knee injury led to surgery just two weeks before the US trials. With little training she still finished first at the trials. The Maine native Benoit, has described her steely determination as having formed in her younger years when she had to consistently disregard the disapproval and derision she endured for being a young woman who ran long distances. A skiing accident led to injury and Benoit began to run to regain fitness for all the other sports that she participated in. She found in distance running her passion.

Entering the Coliseum Benoit along with the 92,000 spectators inside and the millions watching from home were acutely aware that this was a deeply significant moment in sports history. A ferocious competitor but always reticent of the limelight, Benoit later recalled how heading through the tunnel she asked herself ‘are you ready for this?’. Her momentum carried her forward and before she really had time to dwell on that question, she was on to the Coliseum track. The stadium rose together in raucous celebration. In that moment Benoit’s legs turned to jelly. The famous phrase used by Bruce Jenner on his t-shirt at the ’76 Olympics sprung into Benoit’s head ‘FEET, don’t fail me now’. Her feet behaved and Benoit ran to victory, a full 400m ahead of Waitz and to a special place in athletics history.

Although Benoit will forever be celebrated for being the first female Olympic Marathon Gold medalist, her career has many outstanding moments and her achievements place her alongside the pantheon of great athletes. The two time Boston Marathon winner, also won the Chicago Marathon in 1985 setting an American Record that would last 18 years. Although, injuries hampered her career after ’84, it is her longevity that is most remarkable. Benoit has run a sub 3 hour marathon across 5 decades. In 2011 at the Chicago Marathon age 53, she set an Age World Record of 2:47:50 and in 2013 at Boston set a 50-59 Age Group World Record of 2:50:33. Benoit’s pursuit of a sub 3 hour marathon across 6 decades continues….

“If you don’t have passion, you don’t have fire and if you don’t have fire, you can’t ignite anything in life.” Joan Benoit.

Tadhg Crowley

2 June 2022

The 1968 Olympics in Mexico City saw the emergence of African athletes as Olympic track champions. Prior to 1968, no African athlete had won Gold in an Olympic middle distance event. The brilliant Ethiopian Adebe Bikila had won the Olympic Marathon in 1960 (barefoot) and 1964, and a handful of South African athletes had won Gold in sprint and field events down through the years but this was a breakthrough moment for African athletics. In fact it was a seismic shift, with Mohammed Gammoudi (Tunisia) 5000m,  Naftali Temu (Kenya) 10000m, Amos Biwott (Kenya) 3000m Steeplechase, and Kip Keino (Kenya) 1500m all winning Gold. Of these champions, it was Keino who shone brightest in the elevated surroundings (over 2000m above sea level) of Mexico City.

When viewers around the world tuned in to the main event, the 1500m Olympic Final, they would have expected to see World Record holder and star American athlete Jim Ryun to the fore. Instead they were greeted by the long stride of Kip Keino in his white singlet and red shorts. In the early laps, Keino's compatriot Ben Jipcho set the pace before Keino made his move and inspired David Coleman’s' famous commentary "Keino hits the front with two laps to go, the Kenyans are really trying to make the height of 7000ft of Mexico City tell on the World Record holder (Jim Ryun). THE PACE NEAR SUICIDAL ... well inside a world record pace". Keino's tactic was to be ferocious, to build an insurmountable lead and not allow Ryun to use his superior finishing kick. He had 20 metres on Ryun when they hit the bell, and he held this through the back straight, finishing in an Olympic best and winning by the greatest margin in the event's history. The race epitomised Keino's bravery, style and tenacity.

Keino may have been a new name to many of the people tuning in on that October evening but he had already established himself as an elite amongst the elite by setting World Records in the 3000m and 5000m in 1965 and winning two Golds at the Commonwealth games in 1966. The slender policeman from Kipsamo would have been comfortable at altitude having spent his life training in the Rift Valley 6000 ft above sea level. His success and that of his fellow Kenyans triggered an immediate interest in altitude training and its benefits on distance running. As a boy, Keino ran 16 miles as part of his daily school commute and helped his Aunt herd goats in the mountainous region around Eldoret. This unintentional training, barefoot and at altitude, laid the foundation for an incredible athletic career. 

Kip Keino’s glorious success in the 1500m final was only part of his ‘68 Olympic story. As captain of the Kenyan team, he had also qualified for the 5000m and 10000m events. Despite suffering from violent stomach pains caused by a gall bladder infection, Keino decided to run the 10000m. With two laps to go, the pain became too much and he collapsed into the infield. His compatriot Temu going on to victory and securing Kenya’s first Olympic Gold. Keino refused to allow the medics to carry him off instead insisting on finishing out the remaining laps. He had been warned by team doctors not to compete, his infection so severe that any strain on his body could cause him serious harm or even death. Two days later and unperturbed by the doctors advice, Keino won silver in the 5000m, one fifth of a second behind Tunisian Gammoudi. On the day of the 1500m final, Keino was again visited by the team doctor who told him not to run. But he was adamant, and once the doctor left, he got dressed and grabbed a bus to the Estadio Olympico Universitario. The bus got stuck in the afternoon traffic and Keino ran the final mile to the stadium, arriving just as the runners were called. The incident would inspire many stories of ‘the Olympian who was late for his race’ and only helped to grow Keino’s legend. 

Kip Keino would shine again at the 1972 Olympics in Munich, winning Gold in the 3000m Steeplechase and Silver in the 1500m (behind Finnish athlete Pekka Vasala). For the best part of the decade between 1963 and his retirement in 1973, Keino was one of the world’s greatest athletes, winning 11 medals (7 Gold) at major championships. However, it was that special October evening in Mexico City that defined Kip Keino’s career and inspired generations of young Kenyan athletes. 

Tadhg Crowley

3 May 2022