Joyce Smith

Joyce Smith
nation	United Kingdom
birthday	26th October 1937 (age 82)
place of birth	Stoke Newington
Career
Best performance	1:13:06 h (half marathon) 2:29:43 h (marathon)
status	resigned
End of career	1986
last change: August 14, 2018

Joyce Smith (* 26. October 1937 in Stoke Newington as Joyce Esther Byatt ) is a former British long-distance runner who as a 41-year-old a successful career in the marathon began.

Career

Joyce Smith began running in the 1950s - at a time when the longest distance internationally designated for women was the 800-meter run - and won the National Cross Country Championship in 1959 and 1960 .

World record 3,000 meter run in 1971

The opening of longer distances for women’s sport motivated her to return to competitive sport after a baby break at the end of the 1960s. In 1971 she set a world record in the 3,000-meter run and won gold (1972 in San Sebastián), silver ( 1973 in Waregem ) and bronze (1971 in Cambridge) at the Cross of Nations and the Cross Country World Championships . At the 1972 Games in Munich, she took part in the Olympic premiere of the 1,500-meter run for women and reached the semi-finals. A year later she won her third national title in cross-country skiing, and at the European Athletics Championships in Rome in 1974 she won the bronze medal in the 3000 m .

In 1978 she ended her track career with the 3000 meter world record for the W40 age group of 9: 11.2 min, which was to last for 27 years.
The following year, the 41-year-old ran her first marathon. Although her only goal was to have tried this distance once, she immediately improved the British record by nine minutes with her time of 2:41:37 h.

In the next few years she used the opportunities that this talent, discovered late, opened up. In 1979 she won the Avon International Marathon (at that time an unofficial world championship) in Waldniel . In 1979 and 1980 she won the first two editions of the Tokyo International Women's Marathon . In 1980 in Bruges she set a British record in the 25 km road race with 1:28:18 and at the same time a W40 world record.

Winner of the London Marathon 1981

In 1981 she won the premiere of the London Marathon in 2:29:57 h and stayed there as both the first British woman and the first woman over 40 under 2:30 hours. A year later she repeated this victory and set her sixth British record in the marathon with 2:29:43 h.

At the first World Athletics Championships in Helsinki in 1983 , she was ninth. A year later, at almost 47 years of age, she was the oldest female athlete in Olympic history, in eleventh place in the first Olympic women's marathon at the 1984 Games in Los Angeles.

In January 1986 she finished 14th in the Osaka Women's Marathon and that same year she retired from her career. Her time over 10  miles from this year (55:33 min) is still the world record for the W45 age group.

Joyce Smith is still connected to the running world today by serving on the board of trustees of the London Marathon Charitable Trust , like her husband Bryan .

Awards

• In 1984 she was awarded the title MBE .

Personal bests

• 1500 m: 4: 09.37 min, September 7, 1972, Munich
• 3000 m: 8: 55.53 min, July 19, 1974, Crystal Palace
• Half marathon : 1:13:06 h, July 15, 1984, Cambridge
• Marathon: 2:29:43 h, May 9, 1982, London

literature

• Bryan Smith: Joyce Smith's running book. Frederick Muller, London 1983, ISBN 0584110545

Web links

• Joyce Smith in the database of World Athletics (English)
• Athlete portrait on The Power of Ten
• Athlete portrait on marathonspiegel.de ( Memento from September 28, 2007 in the Internet Archive )
• Portrait on coolrunning.com
• London Marathon: First lady is still the one and only , article by Simon Turnbull in The Independent , April 14, 2002
• Joyce Smith in the Sports-Reference database (English; archived from the original )

Individual evidence

1. ↑ arrs.run: National Crosscountry Champions (AAA) for England
2. ↑ gbrathletics: International Cross Country Championships
3. ↑ arrs.run: IAAF World Crosscountry Championships
4. ↑ arrs.run: 3000 m Outdoor Track Rankings for Ages 40–44
5. ↑ arrs.run: GBR Record Progressions - Road
6. ↑ arrs.run: 25K Road Rankings for Ages 40–44 ( Memento of the original from April 5, 2007 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.  
7. ↑ arrs.run: Road 10 Mile Rankings for Ages 45–49
8. ↑ London Marathon: The London Marathon Structure ( Memento from September 27, 2007 in the Internet Archive )
9. ↑ Shaftesbury Barnet Harriers: Club History ( Memento of November 21, 2008 in the Internet Archive )