Marita Koch
Personal information | |
---|---|
Born | [1] Wismar, Bezirk Rostock, East Germany[1] | 18 February 1957
Height | 171 cm (5 ft 7 in)[1] |
Weight | 62 kg (137 lb)[1] |
Sport | |
Sport | Track and field |
Achievements and titles | |
Personal bests | |
Medal record | |
Updated on 30 June 2015. |
Marita Koch (later Meier-Koch; born 18 February 1957) is a German former sprint track and field athlete. During her career she set 16 world records in outdoor sprints as well as 14 world records in indoor events. Her record of 47.60 in the 400 metres, set on 6 October 1985, still stands.
Biography
Born in Wismar, East Germany, Marita Koch displayed exceptional speed even as a young child and was defeating boys much older than herself in sprint races whilst at school. By the time she had turned 15 years old, she was training under Wolfgang Meier. Meier worked as a naval engineer, but also coached athletics part-time. Koch and Meier moved to Rostock where Koch began to study medicine. However, she decided to stop her studies and focus on running instead. Koch was coached by Meier for her entire career, and they later married. She retained her maiden name, and is now known as Marita Koch-Meier. She and her husband have a daughter named Ulrike.[2]
Koch has held world records over several distances from 50 m to 400 m. Some of her best performances are as follows:
- 100 m 10.83 seconds (+1.7) West Berlin (FRG) 8 June 1983
- Karl Marx Stadt(GDR) 10 June 1979
- Bruce Stadium, Canberra (AUS) 6 October 1985
Koch ran a 400 m quarterfinal at the
At the
Koch retired from running in 1987 as one of Germany's most successful athletes. She had suffered from an Achilles tendon injury[4] She and Meier own a sports goods store in Rostock.[5]
The 400 m world record run
On 6 October 1985 at the year's
In her world record run, Koch, running in lane 2, came out of the blocks at a scorching pace and eliminated the stagger on most of her competitors by the end of the first bend. Her 100 m split time was reported to be 11.3 seconds, while her 200 m split time was reported to be 22.4 seconds. At the halfway point in the race, she had completely destroyed most of a world class field. Her 300 m split was reported to be 34.1 seconds (hand timed), the all-time best performance for this distance. During the final stages of the race, the original video footage only captured Koch and
In a 400 m race, the only women to have broken the 48-second barrier are Koch and Jarmila Kratochvílová (47.99 seconds, Helsinki, 1983). Kratochvílová was Koch's main rival over the distance and also a 400 m world record holder in the early 1980s. To this day, no other woman has come within a half a second of Koch.
Drug use controversy
Koch's achievements, along with the performances of other East German female athletes, have long been under suspicion that they were achieved with the aid of illegal performance-enhancing drugs.[9] These drugs were not detectable at the time. In 1991, German anti-drug activists Brigitte Berendonk and Werner Franke were able to save several doctoral theses and other documents written by scientists working for the East German drug research programme.
The documents list the dosage and timetables for the administration of anabolic steroids to many athletes of the former DDR, with one of them being Marita Koch. According to the sources, Koch did use the anabolic steroid
Berendonk and Franke also discovered a letter written by Koch, complaining that her rival, Bärbel Wöckel, was receiving higher doses of steroids than her because Wöckel's uncle was president of the pharmaceutical company Jenapharm.[11]
See also
References
- ^ a b c d Evans, Hilary; Gjerde, Arild; Heijmans, Jeroen; Mallon, Bill; et al. "Marita Koch". Olympics at Sports-Reference.com. Sports Reference LLC. Archived from the original on 17 April 2020. Retrieved 30 June 2015.
- ISBN 3-89602-538-4.
- ^ "Hohe staatliche Auszeichnungen verliehen" [Awarded high state awards]. Neues Deutschland (in German). Vol. 42, no. 243. 15 October 1986. p. 6. Retrieved 23 September 2018.
- ^ "Marita Koch, the East German sprint star..." Los Angeles Times. 3 February 1987. Retrieved 22 September 2020.
- ^ "Marita Koch – Zu schnell, um wahr zu sein?". www.ndr.de (in German). Retrieved 22 September 2020.
- ^ "Unattainable records leave female athletes struggling for acclaim | Anna Kessel". The Guardian. 15 August 2009. Archived from the original on 19 April 2023.
- ^ a b START LIST 400 Metres Women – Round 1 Archived 10 December 2015 at the Wayback Machine, Daegu 2011 (27 August 2011)
- ^ a b 2012 Olympic Games Statistics – Women's 400m, Athletics Weekly
- ^ Goodbody, John (13 July 2006), "Jackson predicts new peak is mountain for others to climb", The Times, archived from the original on 11 September 2012, retrieved 7 July 2011
- ^ Schofield, Matthew (13 February 2015). "East Germany's doping legacy lives on, 25 years later". McClatchy.
- ^ Turnbull, Simon (5 September 2010). "After a quarter of a century, Koch remains untouchable". The Independent. Retrieved 20 December 2023.