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Sally Gunnell's victory in the 400m hurdles at the 1993 World
Championships meant that she was simultaneously the reigning Olympic,
World and Commonwealth champion. The only other major international
honour eluding her grasp was a European title. Gunnell's previous
record at the European Championships was by her standards relatively
mediocre. She had been eliminated in the heats of the 100m hurdles in
1986, and had finished sixth in the 400m hurdles final in 1990. Sally
seemed well on track to rectify this situation in the early part of the
1994 season. She was a class above her European rivals, and her only
loss was to Kim Batten (USA) at Nice on 18 July, a defeat which Sally
quickly avenged six days later at the Goodwill Games, with a comfortable
victory over Batten in 53.51sec.
At the European Championships in
Helsinki, Gunnell (see photo above) easily won the gold medal by
over a second from her nearest rival, and thus became the first woman
athlete to simultaneously hold all four major international titles in an
individual event. Less than two weeks later, Gunnell was in Victoria,
Canada, defending her Commonwealth title. As well as preparing for her
own event and the relay, Gunnell, as team captain, had added pressure at
Victoria, when the news broke that a British female athlete had tested
positive for drugs at the European Cup, which would eventually lead to
the British team's disqualification from the World Cup in September.
Despite her responsibilities to the media and to maintain the morale of
her teammates, Sally easily defended her 400m hurdles title in a new
Games record of 54.51sec. Sally won a second gold medal when she
anchored England's 4 x 400m relay team to victory, repeating the double
gold medal performance she achieved at the previous Commonwealth Games. (Ron Casey)
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