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By the end of 1984, Fatima Whitbread had firmly staked her claim amongst
the world's top javelin throwers, having won the silver medal at the
1983 World Championships, and the bronze medal at the 1984 Olympics.
Whitbread continued to improve in 1985, increasing her personal best to
first 72.12m on 27 June, and then to 72.98m on 31 August. On 31 July
1986, Whitbread competed at her second Commonwealth Games in Edinburgh,
where her best throw of 68.54m could only win her the silver medal
behind the 69.80m winning effort of her long-time rival Tessa Sanderson.
Whitbread's next major challenge was the European Championships at
Stuttgart, in which Sanderson did not compete. The qualifying round at
Stuttgart, on 28 August, was held early in the morning, not a time
conducive to good performances. Taking her first throw at 9.19am,
Whitbread astonished everyone, including herself, when she rifled the
javelin out to a distance of 77.44m, smashing the world record of Petra
Felke (East Germany) by over two metres.
In the final held the
following day, Felke took the early lead with her second round throw of
72.00m. After just failing to reach this distance with her third throw
of 71.94m, Whitbread took the lead with 72.68m on her fourth attempt.
Although Felke improved her best to 72.52m on her last throw, this still
left her short of Whitbread, who thus became the new European champion.
Not needing to take her final attempt to secure victory, Fatima felt
she did not want to win the title 'by a hair', and, looking to achieve a
big throw to underline her superiority, she produced a massive throw of
76.32m. Understandably jubilant with the result, Whitbread (see photo above) had produced the second longest throw in history, inferior only to her world record set the previous day. (Ron Casey)
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