Thomas Thornycroft

Thomas Thornycroft medal table
Thomas Thornycroft
Motor boating
United Kingdom
Olympic Summer Games
gold	1908 London	B class
gold	1908 London	C class

Isaac Thomas Thornycroft (born November 22, 1881 in Basingstoke , † June 6, 1955 ) was a British motorboat driver .

At the Olympic Games in London in 1908 , Thornycroft was, together with the crew of the Gyrinus , Bernard Redwood and John Field-Richards , two-time Olympic champions in motor boating , in the B-class and in the C-class , each over 40 nautical miles. In the B-Class, where only boats with a maximum length of 20 meters were allowed to participate, the Gyrinus started against John Marshall Gorham with the Quicksilver . This, however, had to give up after two laps because water had run into the boat, so that Thornycroft and his crew became the first Olympic champion in motor boating.

In the C-Class, which took place the next day, the boats were only allowed to be seven meters long and weigh a maximum of 800 kilograms. Again the Gyrinus started with only one competitor, the Sea Dog from Warwick Wright . But this time too the rival had to give up because the engine had overheated. Thornycroft and the Gyrinus became double Olympic champions. In the last competition, the A-Class, the Gyrinus did not start, the Frenchman Émile Thubron won .

Since motor boating was never again an Olympic sport after 1908, Thornycroft, Redwood and Field-Richards remain the most successful athletes of this sport with two gold medals.

Thomas Thornycroft was the son of the shipbuilder Sir John Thornycroft , the Gyrinus was designed by Thomas Thornycroft and built in the family's own shipyard. Thomas Thornycroft was a member of the shipyard's board of directors until 1934, where he was jointly responsible for the development of the Swallow boat class for the British Navy. As a sailor, Thornycroft won the Prince of Wales Cup in 1931 . In 1952 he went to Helsinki as a reserve man for the Olympic Games , but was not used.

literature

• Ian Buchanan: British Olympians . Enfield 1991 ISBN 0-85112-952-8

Web links

• Thomas Thornycroft in the Sports-Reference database (English; archived from the original )