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| Born | 14 August 1959 | |||||||||||||||
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Heather Oakes (born Hunte on 14 August 1959) is a British athlete who competed mainly in the 100 metres.
She was born in Hackney, London and joined the Haringey Athletics Club. She competed for Great Britain at the 1980 Summer Olympics held in Moscow where she won the bronze medal with her team mates Kathy Smallwood-Cook, Beverley Goddard and Sonia Lannaman in the women's 4 x 100 metres event. She placed 8th in the individual 100m.
Heather, Kathy and Beverley teamed up again in the 1984 Summer Olympics held in Los Angeles in the 4 x 100 metres where they were joined by Simone Jacobs. They repeated the bronze medal win they had in Moscow in a time of 43.11 well down on the British Record.
Heather placed 7th in the 100m in 11.43 the battle for the minor places was tight with 4/100ths of a second separating 5th and 7th place.
She became Commonwealth 100m Champion in Edinburgh, Scotland 1986. She won in a Personal Best time of 11.20 secs 1/100th ahead of teammate Paula Dunn 11.21 and Canada's Angella Taylor-Issajenko 11.21.
She later anchored the England 4x100 Relay to the Gold medal in 43.39 seconds.
While Heather competed at the highest level for her country she also held down a full time job. This is in contrast to today's athletes who through lottery funding and sponsorship are able to train and compete without distraction.
She is married to fellow 2 time Olympic Bronze medallist Gary Oakes.
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