Sara Simeoni (ITA) celebrates her 1984 Olympic High Jump silver medal (© Mark Shearman)
Italy’s 1980 Olympic women's High Jump champion Sara Simeoni celebrates her 50th Birthday today.
Simeoni was an elegant stylist who, although being pipped in 1977 by her arch-rival Rosemarie (Witschas) Ackermann (GDR) to the distinction of becoming the world’s first ever woman to High Jump 2.00 metres, was very much the inspiration for a whole generation of athletes both in Italy and internationally.
Ackermann was also ahead of Simeoni, when the Italian heroine took her first major international medal at the 1974 European Championships, one of two continental bronze medals she would win, the other being in 1982.
Defeat to the East German also came at the 1976 Montreal Olympics, when Simeoni’s (silver medal) 1.91m clearance was bettered by Ackermann’s 1.93. This was to be the first of three Olympic medals that Simeoni would win in her illustrious career. Gold was to follow at the 1980 Moscow Games in an Olympic record of 1.97m, and another silver medal in 1984 with a 2.00m leap behind West Germany’s Ulrike Meyfarth (2.02 Olympic record).
However, Simeoni’s year of years was 1978, when on two occasions she jumped the World record of 2.01m. Employing an immaculate Fosbury Flop technique she first improved Ackermann’s 2.00m mark, to set the new World record on her second attempt at 2.01m in Brescia, Italy on 4 August.
A greater feat was to occur before the month was out, as on the 31 August in Prague, Czechoslovakia, Simeoni again on her second attempt at 2.01m, leapt clear to equal her own record and take the European Championships gold medal. In second place was Ackermann with 1.99m.
Simeoni continues to play an inspirational role in Athletics, as she is currently a member of the IAAF Women’s Committee.
IAAF
