Gérard Côté

Gérard Côté, CM, CQ ( born July 27, 1913 in Saint- Barnabé -Sud, Quebec, † June 13, 1993 in Saint- Hyacinthe, Quebec ) was a Canadian athlete who specialized in the marathon. He won the Boston Marathon four times.

Biography

Côté took for the first time in 1931 at an endurance race and won in the same year for the first time. At marathons, he participated in 1935, where he noticed the Yonkers Marathon with a good twelfth place. For its first participation in the prestigious Boston Marathon in 1936, he ranked 23rd. However, he failed to qualify for the 1936 Summer Olympic Games in Berlin. A fundraiser that his participation but should allow not brought a sufficient money. In the same year he errange the Chiclets - marathon in Montreal his first win, and thus became a Canadian champion.

1940 Côté won the Boston Marathon for the first time in a new record time. In the same year he also won the Yonkers Marathon and was the first French Canadians the Lou Marsh Trophy as Canada's athlete of the year. His success in Boston he repeated in the years 1942, 1943 and 1948, in Yonkers, he was successful in 1943 and 1946. During the Second World War he worked for the Canadian Army as a physical education teacher.

With wins in Boston, Los Angeles and Hamilton Côté was before the Olympic Summer Games 1948 in London of the favorites. However, leg cramps were only a disappointing 17th place. He also held the British Empire Games in 1950 in Auckland and to the British Empire and Commonwealth Games in 1954 in Vancouver. 1956 ended Côté his sporting career. By 1975, he organized an annual marathon in his hometown of Saint- Hyacinthe.