Beverley Whitfield

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Olympic medal record
Women’s swimming
Gold	1972 Munich	200 m breaststroke
Bronze	1972 Munich	100 m breaststroke

Beverley Joy Whitfield (June 15, 1954 – August 20, 1996 in Shellharbour, New South Wales) was an Australian breaststroke swimmer of the 1970s, who won a gold medal in the 200m breaststroke at the 1972 Summer Olympics in Munich. She was coached by Terry Gathercole and Don Talbot.

The daughter of a Wollongong steelworker, Whitfield was taught to swim along with her sister and their cousins at the age four by her uncle, who was active in the local Learn to Swim program. Along with her sister and cousins, she was a childhood member of the Shellharbour Swimming Club, and was mainly taken to local swimming competitions by her father and uncle. This became even more pronounced following the death of her mother from cancer. At the age of 11, her uncle decided to send her to Sydney every weekend to receive training from Terry Gathercole, an Olympic medal-winning breaststroker. This involved long daytrips for her family to help her fulfill her dream. During school holidays, she boarded with Gathercole to train under him on a daily basis. This lead to such improvement that at the age of 14, she narrowly missed selection for the 1968 Summer Olympics in Mexico City, finishing sixth and fourth in the 100m and 200m breaststroke respectively.

In 1969, Gathercole was appointed as a swimming coach in Midland, Texas, forcing Whitfield to travel to Texas and board with his family to continue her training for six months, where she sharpened her racing skills with more frequent competition. In 1969, she came sixth and third respectively at the US Championships. On her return to Australia, Gathercole arranged for her to train under Don Talbot.

Whitfield proceeded to win both breaststroke titles at the 1970 Australian Championships and then repeated the victories at the 1970 Commonwealth Games in Edinburgh, as well as adding a third gold medal in the 4x100m medley relay, setting Commonwealth records in all three events. Whitfield again won both breaststroke events at the Australian Championships leading up to the 1972 Summer Olympics in Munich.

Coming into the Olympics, she was not regarded as a favourite, with her best times being substantially slower than other swimmers. Whitfield's best time in the 100m breaststroke was only 1m 18s, but she repeatedly lowered this throughout the competition to claim a bronze medal in the final, in a time of 1m 15.73s. In the 200m breaststroke, she was the sixth fastest qualifier for the final. Despite being only fourth at the 150m mark, she overtook her rivals in the closing stages to claim gold. Her time of 2m 41.71s was 2.5s faster than her previous best, pipping Dana Schoenfield of the United States. On her arrival in her home town, she was accorded a street parade.

This was Whitfield's career peak. She won both breastsroke titles the following year at the Australian Championships, but failed to win a medal at the 1973 World Aquatics Championships in Belgrade. Again in 1974, she won both events at the national championships, but managed only a bronze in the 200m event and a silver in the medley relay. In 1975, she lost both of her national titles, and subsequently retired. She later worked for a period as a youth worker, and died suddenly in 1996 at the age of 42.