Dana Zatopkova, Champion Javelin Thrower, Is Dead at 97

She is best remembered for winning the gold medal at the 1952 Helsinki Olympics, just an hour after her husband, Emil Zatopek, won the men’s 5,000-meter run. Dana Zatopkova, who won the women’s javelin throw for Czechoslovakia in the 1952 Olympics an hour after her husband, Emil Zatopek, won the men’s 5,000-meter run, died on Friday in Prague. She was 97. Her death was announced by the Czech Olympic Committee.

Zatopkova threw the javelin in four consecutive Olympics, from 1948 to 1960, and won the silver medal in 1960 in Rome. In 1958, in Frankfurt, Germany, she broke a world record by throwing it 55. 73 meters (182 feet 10 inches), almost 10 inches better than the previous record. It was the longest throw ever made with a wooden javelin (javelins are now made of metal).

At 35 she became the oldest woman to break a world outdoor record in any event. But she is best remembered for her gold medal triumph in Helsinki, Finland, in 1952, when she reached 50. 47 meters (165 feet 7 inches) on the first of her six throws in the final. An hour before, Zatopek, who broke 18 world records in his career and is considered by many to have been the best distance runner in Olympics history, won the gold in the 5,000-meter in thrilling come-from-behind fashion, moving from fourth to first in a furious last lap.

At the time, Zatopkova was preparing for her own competition, in an event that dates to the original Olympics in ancient Greece. “I was closeted in the changing room alone trying to concentrate on the ordeal ahead and trying to stay composed, but it was impossible,” she recalled in an interview with Radio Prague in 2012. “So I listened to the crowd cheering, trying in vain to figure out who they were cheering for. “When the noise died down, I could wait no longer.

I jumped up and ran out of the changing room, bumping into the Soviet coach, Romanov. ‘Who won? ’ I blurted out. And I remember he looked at me dumbfounded because, of course, Emil had won, and his own wife had not gone to watch.

” Zatopek also won the 10,000-meter and the marathon at Helsinki, his first, achieving a triple that no one has matched. At a news conference after Zatopkova’s victory, Zatopek playfully tried to take credit for his wife’s gold medal, saying that he had inspired her. Zatopkova was quick with a retort.