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You are > Home > The great Bob Tisdall blazed a captivating trail
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Thursday, August 12, 2004
The great Bob Tisdall blazed a captivating trail
By: Finbarr Slattery
ONLY three Irish persons have won gold medals in track and field events in the Olympic Games - Bob Tisdall, Pat O’Callaghan and Ronnie Delaney. Of those three, the one who fascinated me most was Bob Tisdall because I was ignorant of his feats as an athlete.
I had to wait to read his obituaries in the papers, following his recent death in Brisbane, Australia, at the age of 97, to find out what sort of person Bob Tisdall really was.
His ability at athletics secured him gold in the 1932 Olympic Games in Los Angeles. One thing I learned straight away was that he defied all logic to secure his gold medal - he had that extra special something that enabled him to get that all too elusive prize.
It is well worth recalling in detail how he got to LA in the first instance and here is how he made it:
Robert Morton Newburgh Tisdall was born in Ceylon, now Sri Lanka, in 1907, to parents intensely proud of their Irish origins. His father, William, hailed from Bantry and his mother, Meta Morton, grew up in Nenagh. Appropriately, it was in Nenagh, and later Dromineer, that the young Robert spent his formative years.
Not until he arrived at Cambridge University did he have the opportunity of indulging his passion for sport, and college records show that in the annual ‘colours’ match with Oxford in 1931 he won four events, the 440 yards, 120 yards hurdles, shot-putt and long jump competitions.
The winning figures in each instance were, however, far from inspiring. And outside intervarsity sport he remained largely unknown here until early 1932 when he wrote to General Eoin O’Duffy, president of the Irish Olympic Council, requesting that he be selected for the Irish team going to the Los Angeles Games.
O’Duffy later recalled that he was both astounded and impressed by the “cheek” of the young graduate, more so since Tisdall indicated that he wished to compete in the 400 metres hurdles, an event in which, on his own admission, he had competed just once.
O’Duffy responded by inviting him to participate in a trial race in Dublin and Tisdall’s reaction to that show of faith was no less brave. Although recently married, he promptly resigned his job in London and took himself off to an orchard in Sussex where, in a disused railway carriage, he worked on honing his body for the biggest test of his career.
Without even the semblance of a track, he trained on home-made hurdles. O’Duffy decreed that he would have to run the trial in Croke Park in 55 seconds or less, the time recorded by the American Johnny Gibson in the Tailteann Games at the same venue four years earlier, and arranged for Andy Nolan, a member of the Garda club, to run against him.
The best Tisdall could do on the day was 56.2 seconds, and he left the stadium deeply disillusioned. But O’Duffy’s admiration for the sheer effrontery of the man persisted, and he arranged for another trial to be held in conjunction with the Irish championships.
Tisdall once more retired to his railway carriage, and his efforts paid off. With Nolan again in opposition, he raced around Croke Park in 54.2 seconds, and suddenly Los Angeles beckoned. He set off with the Irish team on July 3 for the 14-day land and sea journey to California, arriving at the Olympic village in the Baldwin Hills overlooking Los Angeles in a state of nearexhaustion.
The remaining 14 days of his preparation for the Olympic Games were odd - and distinctly worrying for General O’Duffy.
He spent most of his time in bed and, when he was not sleeping or resting in his room, he was invariably stretched out in the sun.
Now, when the die was cast in earnest and he had to perform, he mesmerised them all winning his first heat in 54.8 seconds and two hours later won the second semi-final in 52.8 seconds. In the final Bob Tisdall rose to the first of the 10 hurdles in the lead and was never headed. He was so far ahead jumping the last that he couldn’t believe what was happening.
“I experienced a strange sense of loneliness” he recorded afterwards, “I began to wonder if the others had fallen over”.
This probably caused a lapse in his concentration and caused Tisdall to knock the last hurdle and miss out on a record - at that time knocking a hurdle precluded him from claiming a world record.
He had done enough to join the immortality stakes and, now 70 years later, we are basking in his glory. Thanks Bob Tisdall for blazing a trail that still captivates us all.
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