Josia Thugwane
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| Olympic medal record | |||
| Men's athletics | |||
|---|---|---|---|
| Gold | Atlanta 1996 | Marathon | |
Josia Thugwane (born April 15, 1971) is a South African athlete, winner of the marathon race at the 1996 Summer Olympics.
Born in Bethal, Thugwane ran his first marathon in 1991, but his breakthrough to the international athletics scene came in 1995, when he won the Honolulu Marathon.
At Atlanta, in the 1996 Olympic marathon, a large leading pack stayed in contact with each other for most of the race, until at the 35 km mark when Thugwane initiated a break away and he along with Lee Bong-Ju from South Korea and Eric Wainaina from Kenya. They stayed together until entering the stadium, when Thugwane got a slight lead. Thugwane finished 3 seconds ahead of Lee for the closest Olympic marathon finish ever.
Thugwane had a very successful year in 1997 by winning the Fukuoka Marathon, but then his career went down. He failed to finish in three successive marathons, and finished only twentieth in the 2000 Sydney Olympic marathon despite top ten finishes in the New York Marathon and London Marathon that year.
In 2002 he won the Nagano Olympic Memorial Marathon in Japan.
| Olympic champions in men's marathon |
|---|
| 1896: Spiridon Louis | 1900: Michel Théato | 1904: Thomas J. Hicks | 1906: William Sherring | 1908: Johnny Hayes | 1912: Kenneth McArthur | 1920: Hannes Kolehmainen | 1924: Albin Stenroos | 1928: Boughera El Ouafi | 1932: Juan Carlos Zabala | 1936: Sohn Kee-chung | 1948: Delfo Cabrera | 1952: Emil Zátopek | 1956: Alain Mimoun | 1960: Abebe Bikila | 1964: Abebe Bikila | 1968: Mamo Wolde | 1972: Frank Shorter | 1976: Waldemar Cierpinski | 1980: Waldemar Cierpinski | 1984: Carlos Lopes | 1988: Gelindo Bordin | 1992: Hwang Young-Cho | 1996: Josia Thugwane | 2000: Gezahegne Abera | 2004: Stefano Baldini |
