Time Britain Had another Great Female Sprinter

[Rog]

Cool...I guess Andrea was one of the first of the cursed British female sprinters. In 74 when she was ranked third in the world she finished 3rd in the Euro Champs 100 - behind Irena Szewinska and Renate Stecher. In other words, it took two of the greatest sprinters of all time to beat her. In 75 she was ranked behind only Stecher. Unfortunately in 76 she had severe injury problems, yet still managed to make the Olympic final (7th). Without injury she could have challenged for a medal... as could Sonia Lannaman, who had taken over as UK no.1, but who suffered injury right at the Olympics themselves. Imagine 2 out of 3 Olympic 100 medals going to British sprinters! Unfortunately pretty much every great or potentially great UK sprinter (Cook, Hunte, Colyear, Callender, Kinch, MacDonald etc right up to the present day) has been blighted with injury to some extent

[Gabriella]

The penny dropped along with my jaw and i almost started cryin , it's only Andrea Lynch

Well jell!!!

My claim to fame is my physio is married to Sonia Lannaman. He has signed athletics memorabilia all round his pratice, and used to be the UK team physio too.

I've had some very interesting conversations with him about who was sleeping with who and taking what substances!

[mump boy]

The penny dropped along with my jaw and i almost started cryin , it's only Andrea Lynch

Well jell!!!

My claim to fame is my physio is married to Sonia Lannaman. He has signed athletics memorabilia all round his pratice, and used to be the UK team physio too.

I've had some very interesting conversations with him about who was sleeping with who and taking what substances!

What's Sonia up to these days ??

you can PM me the rest of the gossip

[trevorp]

What's Sonia up to these days ??

Amongst other things, managing to look fine in her fifties!
Her son showed promise as a sprinter, especially over 200m (ranked 3rd in his age group at 14) but opted for football and was given a place in the Academy of the team I support. He's been there a couple of years now but I've not really heard much about him. As you know, competition is fierce in professional football and very few make it, so fingers crossed for the lad.
One of Sonia's contemporaries, Wendy Clarke, married fellow sprinter Les Hoyte (brother of the more successful Trevor) and produced two footballing sons, Gavin and Justin. Wendy's twin is 6.44m long-jumper Barbara, who married triple-jumper Aston Moore; she is also aunt to 400m runner Chris Clarke. Quite a family.

[Rog]

Any and all Sonia Lannaman/Sonia Lannaman's husband PMs welcome here too

If you want an info trade, I've heard a rumour that Ben Johnson took drugs before he won his 100 gold in 88

I hear Marion Jones may have indulged too

[mump boy]

What's Sonia up to these days ??

Amongst other things, managing to look fine in her fifties!

WOW

Sonia and Andrea were just before my time so although i know who they are there has always been a sense of mystery about these 70's sprint queens. They have no major champs medals (I know there are EC and CG but there aren't many books written about them) or WR so there's not a lot of info about them to read about, so i' not really sure how they fit in to place.

The idea that in the UK we actually had female sprinters who could take on the world and the fact that (apart from Kathy who was almost their contemporary) there has been no one else since makes them all the more important.

That they are both doing great and still involved in the sport, even in small way, makes me very happy.