This week is the 100th anniversary of Eric Liddell winning Olympic gold. His life story, and the tale behind his Olympic achievement, remains as…
And then, if you go a wee bit further back, there’s Kenny Dalglish, Jackie Stewart, Ken Buchanan and Liz McColgan.
Having been selected for GB’s team for the Paris Games in 1924, Liddell was strongly fancied as one of the gold medal favourites in the 100m.Liddell, as the son of two missionaries, was highly religious and chose not to race on Sundays. Liddell was able to run the 200m just days prior to the 400m, in which he won bronze. Despite that medal, though, he was forced to contend with some less than complimentary press coverage in the lead-up to the 400m in which much of the media expressed their disbelief that he’d prioritised God over Olympic 100m success.
Following his success in Paris, the Scot committed fully to missionary work, returning to China in 1925 and being ordained as a minister in 1932. Japan invaded China in 1937 and the British government advised all British nationals to leave the country but despite his family leaving China for Canada, Liddell himself remained and in 1943, he was interned by the Japanese authorities in a camp at Weihsien.
It’s fascinating to look back at Liddell’s races – there is the briefest video clip online of his Olympic win – with his distinct style which saw him run with his chin tilted to the sky and his body upright. The ash-grey cinder track on which the 1924 Olympics took place is a world away from the high-tech tartan tracks of today. And the competitors are dressed almost identically all in white with only their numbers pinned onto their chest able to be used to distinguish them from each other.
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