Hassiba Boulmerka

Hassiba Boulmerka (Arabic حسيبة بولمرقة, DMG Hasiba Bū - l - marqa; * July 10, 1968 in Constantine ) is a retired Algerian middle distance runner. She is the first Algerian woman at all, the Olympic champion was.

Boulmerka began as a young girl with athletics, specializing in the middle distances 800 m and 1500 m. She was successful in national and regional race, but had no significant competitors. At the Olympic Games in Seoul in 1988 she divorced in both middle-distance race from already in the flow.

Boulmerkas services were gradually getting better and 1991, made ​​his international breakthrough. The IAAF World Championships in Tokyo, she won the 1500 - meter race and was the first African world champion in athletics.

Their successes provoked not only positive reactions. In her home, she was regularly threatened by Islamic fundamentalists, because they had allegedly attracted much too freely in the competitions. Boulmerka was forced to move to Europe to train there. Despite all these problems, she won the 1500 - meter race at the Olympic Games in Barcelona in 1992 and became the first ever Algerian Olympic champion.

The next two seasons did not run so successfully, yet she won at the World Championships in Stuttgart in 1993 a bronze medal. Prior to the 1995 World Championships in Gothenburg she won in the current season, a single race. This they did not prevent her to triumph over 1500 meters. It was their only win of the season and also her last major success.

She participated in the 1996 Olympic Games in Atlanta in part, but sprained his ankle during the race. After the 1997 season, in which she had decided not to defend her world title, she stepped away from professional sports. Later Boulmerka was elected to the Athletes' Commission of the IOC.