Ken McArthur

Ken McArthur
Ken McArthur after the 1912 award ceremony
Full name	Kennedy Kane McArthur
nation	South African Union
birthday	February 10, 1881 or 1882
place of birth	Ballymoney ,  UK
size	188 cm
Weight	77 kg
date of death	June 13, 1960
Place of death	Potchefstroom ,  South Africa
Career
discipline	Long distance running
Best performance	Marathon: 2: 36: 54.8 h
Medal table
Olympic games 1 × 0 × 0 ×
Olympic games gold Stockholm 1912 Marathon run

Ken McArthur (actually: Kennedy Kane McArthur ; born February 10, 1881 or 1882 in Ballymoney , Northern Ireland , † June 13, 1960 in Potchefstroom ) was a South African marathon runner and Olympic champion .

McArthur, whose first name is often incorrectly given as Kenneth , was discovered as a promising athlete in his youth. In 1901 he emigrated to South Africa.

The marathon at the Olympic Games in Stockholm in 1912 took place in great heat; the Portuguese Francisco Lázaro died of heat stroke . McArthur and fellow countryman Christopher Gitsham ran together and quickly took the lead. Sure of victory, Gitsham stopped to drink and expected his colleague to join as agreed. Instead, McArthur kept running, increasing his lead and finishing 58 seconds earlier than Gitsham.

The next season, McArthur injured his foot in an accident and was forced to retire from athletics . He ran a total of six marathons in his career and finished all of them as the winner.

Web links

• Kennedy McArthur in the South African Sport and Arts Hall of Fame ( Memento August 26, 2011 in the Internet Archive )
• Article about the 1912 Olympic marathon on marathoninfo.free.fr (French)
• Ken McArthur in the Sports-Reference database (English; archived from the original )

Ken McArthur shortly before the Stockholm Olympic Stadium

Ken McArthur wins the 1912 Olympic marathon