biography
pronunciation:
[zatopek]
| sex:
| male
|
| lived:
| (1922–2000)
|
| biography:
| Athlete and middle-distance runner, born in Kopřivnice, E Czech Republic. After many successes in Czechoslovak track events, he won the gold medal for the 10 000 m at the 1948 Olympics in London. For the next six years, despite an astonishingly laboured style, he proved himself to be the greatest long-distance runner of his time, breaking 13 world records. In the 1952 Olympics in Helsinki he achieved a remarkable golden treble: he retained his gold medal in the 10 000 m, and also won the 5000 m and the marathon - the only athlete to complete such a feat at one Olympiad. His wife, fellow athlete Dana Zatopkova (née Ingrova) (1922– ), also won a gold medal (for the javelin) in 1952. |
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