Herb Elliott

Herbert Elliott ( born February 25, 1938 in Perth, Australia ) is a former Australian athlete ( middle-distance runner ), who won the 1500-meter with a new world record time of 3:35,6 minutes at the Olympic Games in Rome in 1960 gold.

Life

Elliott was a student of Percy Cerutty. This resulted in a rather unconventional training methods. A specialty of Cerutty were sand dunes runs.

The special routes from Elliott were the 1500 meters and the mile. During his career he lost only one race on the 1500 -meter distance. He put on 6 August 1958, a new world record for the mile in 3:54,5 minutes. On 28 August of the same year he broke in 3:36,0 minutes in Gothenburg also has the record for the 1500 meter course. At the Commonwealth Games (then Empire Games ) in 1958 in Cardiff ( Wales) won the 880 -yard Elliott in 1:49 minutes and the mile in 3:59 minutes. In the same year he was awarded the Sportsman of the Year Award from the Associated Press.

1960 Elliott was back in top form and announced before the Olympic Games to: Who wants to beat me, must run world record! He eventually won the race over 1500 meters on September 6, 1960 in Rome with a new world record time of 3:35,6 minutes.

In May 1961 Elliott resigned from active competitive sports.

Later he worked for the sportswear manufacturer Puma, where he was finally General Manager (Chief Executive) for the North American market. At the organization of the 2000 Summer Olympics in Sydney Elliott relevant to the Australian Olympic Committee ( AOC) was involved.