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Katharine Merry

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Name
  
Katharine Merry

Role
  
Athlete


Spouse
  
Olivier Jean-Theodore

Movies
  
Fast Girls

Katharine Merry A day in the life of Katharine Merry Athletics Weekly

Born
  
21 September 1974 (age 49) (
1974-09-21
)
Dunchurch, Warwickshire

Olympic medals
  
Athletics at the 2000 Summer Olympics – Women's 400 metres

Similar People
  
Cathy Freeman, Linford Christie, Kathy Smallwood‑Cook, Donna Fraser, Darren Campbell

Profiles

Live and kicking gunge stop the snot katharine merry


Katharine Merry (born 21 September 1974) is an English former sprinter. She won the bronze medal in the 400 metres at the 2000 Sydney Olympics and was the fastest woman in the world over 400m in 2001, with her career best of 49.59 secs. She also represented Great Britain at the 1996 Atlanta Olympics and won the 200 metres at the 1993 European Junior Championships.

Contents

Katharine Merry 32 Katharine Merry 34 greatest Olympic moments GQcouk

Decathlon coventry steve parry and katharine merry


Career

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Born in Dunchurch, Warwickshire, Merry had a career that spanned 20 years. A member of the Birchfield Harriers athletics club, at the age of 12 she topped the UK Under 13 rankings in 7 different events. She was the fastest girl in the world aged 14 years old, and started her international GB career aged just 13, and stayed on the junior team for a record 6 years, which included 5 Junior Championships, winning a total of 6 medals. She transferred into a successful senior athlete with her Olympic medal in Sydney, in the 'Race of the Games' winning bronze behind Australian favourite Cathy Freeman in Stadium Australia in front of 112,000 people. The following year she became World number 1. She was coached by fellow Olympic medallist Linford Christie in his Cardiff based training squad, which included fellow Olympic medallist Darren Campbell. She is also with Christie's sports agency Nuff Respect. Merry still holds various UK age record bests, including U/13 high jump and several sprints, as well as the Senior UK Indoor 200 m record of 22.83 secs. Also World age records, including aged 14, 7.35 secs for 60 m indoors.

Katharine Merry Olympic athlete Katharine Merry I loved the roar of the

She is 3rd on the UK All Time 400 m lists with 49.59 secs.

Katharine Merry Katharine Merry Nuff Respect Linford Christie39s Sports

After suffering from a bone spur growth on her right heel bone, and after 2 operations, in July 2005 Merry announced her official retirement from athletics. She had been suffering from the injury since 2001 and was struggling to get it healed fully. It had prevented her from getting back into proper training, meaning she could not get back to her year 2000 form. Despite this, she still ended the 2001 season as the world's fastest female 400 m runner.

Retirement

Merry now works freelance in the media on radio and TV. This has included working in Beijing and London at the Olympics for the BBC, and was the sole field event commentator for the hugely successful Channel 4 coverage of the Paralympic Games in 2012, as well as working for Sky TV, Eurosport and Channel Five. A multi tasker Merry now commentates, presents and hosts sporting events around the world.

Merry appeared in All New Celebrity Total Wipeout on 25 September, where she struck up a rivalry with the man who, in her words, "ate all the pies", John Regis. She 'ran' the qualifier in 2:16, beating Regis by 50 seconds and then beating him again in the next two rounds but losing finally in the Wipeout Zone, finishing 3rd behind Regis and eventual winner DJ JK. She won overall, 3 events to 1.

She is a regular on BBC's A Question of Sport and BBC's 5Live Fighting Talk. In December 2013, on the one episode she was on, Merry came third out of four contestants on BBC's Celebrity Mastermind, with a specialist subject of Aston Villa 1980–1990.

Personal life

Merry was based in Cardiff while training with Linford Christie, before moving to Bristol after retirement. Merry married in September 2014 and lives in Birmingham. Her son was born in February 2011 and her daughter in March 2014.

She is a supporter of Aston Villa football club.

References

Katharine Merry Wikipedia


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