IRENA SZEWINSKA

Legend: Irena Szewinska (POL)

• 3-time Olympic gold medallist;
• 400m world record (49.75sec) set in Bydgoszcz on 22 June 1976
• 1964, 1968, 1972 and 1976 Olympic Games - 3 gold medals, 2 silver and 2 bronze
  10 ratified world records

Szewinska is one of the most successful and multi-talented athletes of all time. She broke 10 world records and is the only athlete, either male or female, to have held a world record in the 100m, 200m and the 400m events. Winning her first Olympic gold in 1964 as an 18-year-old, in 1973 she discovered the event with which she is most usually associated, the 400m. She became the first woman to break 50 seconds over one lap of the track and won the 400m at the 1976 Olympic Games in another world record of 49.28.

Born: Saint Petersburg, Russia, 24 May 1946
Died: Warsaw, Poland, 29 June 2018