Phil Edwards (athlete)

Edwards (left) and Percy Williams (center)

athletics
bronze	1932	800 m
bronze	1936	800 m
bronze	1932	1500 m
bronze	1928	4 × 400 m relay
bronze	1932	4 × 400 m relay

Phil Edwards (actually: Philip Aaron Edwards ; born September 13, 1907 in Georgetown , Guyana ; † September 6, 1971 in Montréal , Québec ) was a Canadian athlete, who in the late 1920s and early 1930s as a runner over 400 , 800 and 1500 meters was successful. The 1.76 m tall and 64 kg heavy mulatto started for McGill University . He took part in three Olympic Games and won a total of five bronze medals.

Phil Edwards first emigrated to the United States and enrolled at New York University in 1926. Although he set several college records, he was not accepted into the US Olympic team. He then received an invitation to start for Canada from Melville Robinson , the founder of the British Empire Games and manager of the Canadian Olympic team. He moved to Canada and became a student at McGill University, where he was head of the track and field team from 1931 to 1936. At the British Empire Games, however, he competed for his native Guyana.

After finishing his sporting career, Phil Edwards made a name for himself as a specialist in tropical diseases .

successes

400 meters

Phil Edwards started on this route at the 1928 Olympic Games in Amsterdam . He made it to the semi-finals, where he finished sixth and last in 50.2 s after winning the quarter-finals with 49.2 s. During this time, however, he would also have been eliminated in the semifinals and come last in the final.

Even in 1930 at the Empire Games in Hamilton, he had no luck over the quarter mile (440 yds.). He was eliminated in advance.

800 meters

Things went much better for Edwards over the middle distance. At the 1928 Olympic Games in Amsterdam, he scored 1: 52.8 min in the semifinals, a time that would have put him in second place in the final. There he had to be content with fourth place in 1: 54.0 min behind the German Hermann Engelhard (bronze in 1: 53.8 min).

Four years later at the Olympic Games in Los Angeles it increased to 1: 51.5 min and came behind the Briton Tommy Hampson (gold in the world record time of 1: 49.7 min) and his compatriot Alex Wilson (silver in 1 : 49.9 min) in third place.

Four years later, at the 1936 Games in Berlin , he was represented for the third time in an 800-meter final. In 1: 53.6 min he did not come close to the time of Los Angeles, but came back third behind John Woodruff from the USA (gold in 1: 52.9 min) and the Italian Mario Lanzi (silver in 1 : 53.3 min).

Edwards also competed over the half mile (880 yds.) At the British Empire Games in Hamilton in 1930 and in London in 1934 . In 1930 he was fifth, in 1934 he won the gold medal in 1: 54.2 minutes.

1500 meters

Edwards competed over 1500 meters in Los Angeles in 1932 and in Berlin in 1936. In Los Angeles he was initially lucky when he narrowly qualified for the final with a moderate 4: 03.5 minutes. There, however, he managed an increase of almost ten seconds (3: 52.8 min), which won the bronze medal behind the Italian Luigi Beccali (gold in 3: 51.2 min) and the British John Cornes (silver in 3: 52.6 min).

In Berlin Edwards even improved to 3: 50.4 min. However, this time was only enough for fifth place (New Zealander Jack Lovelock won in the world record time of 3: 47.8 min). At the British Empire Games he competed twice - in 1930 and 1934 - over the mile, but did not get into the medal ranks.

4 x 400 meter relay

In the Canadian 4 x 400 meter relay , Edwards was part of the Canadian team in the 1928, 1932 and 1936 games, but without ever being the final runner. But in 1936 he was the only runner left from the team from 1928. While in 1936 a medal was narrowly missed with a fourth place, the Canadian team came in 3: 15.4 min in 1928 ( Alex Wilson , Edwards, Stanley Glover and James Ball ) and in 1932 in 3: 12.8 min ( Ray Lewis , James Ball, Edwards and Wilson) in third place each.

Phil Edwards' personal bests are given as:

• 49.1 s over 400 m
• 1: 50.6 min over 1500 m (ran 1932)
• 3: 50.4 min over 1500 m (ran 1936)

Awards

• In 1936, Phil Edwards became the first recipient of the Lou Marsh Trophy .
• In 1997 he was inducted into the Canadian Sports Hall of Fame and the McGill University Sports Hall of Fame.
• The Phil A. Edwards Memorial Trophy was founded in 1972 and has been awarded annually for outstanding athletic achievements ever since.

Web links

• Phil Edwards in the Sports-Reference database (English; archived from the original )