In an interview I did with swimming legend David Wilkie in 2013, I asked him if he wanted to live to a ripe old age. He replied: "I'm not sure about that. You know, three score and 10 would sort of be satisfactory." Sadly, on 22 May 2024, David did indeed die at the age of 70. He also told me he wanted to be remembered "as a great athlete and a good man". That much was already guaranteed long before then.
Millions of us Brits were bursting with pride when we watched an emotional David Wilkie step up to the Olympic podium and receive his gold medal for the 200m breaststroke at the 1976 Montreal Games. Completing the event in a world record time, he was the first British swimmer to win an Olympic gold medal since Anita Lonsbrough 16 years earlier.
"When that medal was hung around my neck I thought: "The amount of work that's gone into winning this little thing is atrocious!' he revealed. It started for David in Sri Lanka where he was born (on 8 March 1954) and brought up, learning his chosen sport at the Colombo Swimming Club. Aged, 11 his parents sent him to boarding school in their native Scotland.
This story is from the July 2024 edition of Best of British.
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This story is from the July 2024 edition of Best of British.
Start your 7-day Magzter GOLD free trial to access thousands of curated premium stories, and 9,000+ magazines and newspapers.
Already a subscriber? Sign In
Forties Post – Plastic Fantastic – Andrew Wilson shines the spotlight on a pioneering plastic surgeon
A hero in many people's books and even a war hero to others - John was recognised in his lifetime by his contemporaries, his patients and in letters that made their way into the local newspaper, the Staffordshire Sentinel. Over time that gradually fell away, to the point where, if asked, few people would ever have heard of John Grocott - apart from his former patients, for whom the universal question appears to have been: "How do you say thank you to someone who has made my life worth living?"
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