Athletics in the UK: The Rise and Fall of the BAF

121 What about the athletes? new generation, that included Colin Jackson, Roger Black, John Regis and Jon Ridgeon, had arrived with perfect timing. The old guard had not quite finished and gave a farewell flourish at the 1986 European Championships in Stuttgart. Seb Coe, who had never won a major title over the distance at which he held the world record, finally succeeded, leading a clean sweep of medals in the 800m and taking the gold ahead of Tom McKean and Steve Cram. The roles were reversed in the 1500m when Cram just held off a fast finishing Coe to take the gold. Elsewhere, Fatima Whitbread had set the stadium alight with a world record in the qualifying round of the women’s javelin and maintained her form to win the gold in the final, ahead of her nemesis Lillak and deposed world record holder Petra Felke from East Germany. Linford Christie (100m), Roger Black (400m) and Daley Thompson (decathlon) each added European gold to the Commonwealth titles they had gained earlier in the year in Edinburgh and Jack Buckner became European Champion over 5000m. Steve Ovett, in a last hurrah, had won the 5000m at the Commonwealth Games. The main events in 1987 were the European Cup in Prague, to be followed by the second world championships in Rome. Britain had never won the European Cup and the men’s team finished a respectable third, with the women fifth. The world championships in Rome saw Britain produce a solid if unspectacular performance with only one gold medal, from Fatima Whitbread in the women’s javelin. Linford Christie had become involved in a dispute with head coach Frank Dick over the running order in the sprint relay and this escalated into a public and much publicised altercation with the press. Although he claimed that his running had not been affected, Christie could manage only fourth in the 100m. British pride was recovered with a typically gutsy run by Peter Elliott to take the 800m silver medal; Jon Ridgeon and Colin Jackson took silver and bronze respectively in the 110m hurdles; John Regis took silver in the 200m; Jack Buckner took bronze in the 5000m; and the 4x400m relay team took silver. This championship saw the end of a legend when Daley Thompson finally ran out of fitness and years and finished out of the medals. As a mark of their respect for him the decathlon medallists insisted that Daley accompany them on their lap of honour.