Maureen CAIRD

At the 1968 Olympics, 17-year-old New South Wales high school girl Maureen Caird made history by becoming the youngest individual athlete to win an athletics gold medal. At 17 years and 19 days, Caird remains, as of 2017, the youngest individual track event gold medalist at the Olympics. The 80 m hurdles favorites in Mexico were Caird’s older teammate Pam Kilborn, who had not lost since the 1964 Olympics in which she was the bronze medalist, and the 1964 Olympic champion and 1966 European champion East German Karin Balzer, but they both started poorly in the final. Balzer never recovered and finished fifth, while Kilborn came on strong at the end and almost caught her teammate Caird at the finish line, settling for silver. After 1968 Olympics, the 80 hurdles was replaced by the 100 metre hurdles and in this new event, Caird won silver at the 1970 Commonwealth Games behind Kilborn.

Caird attempted to defend her Olympic title, but did not get past the heats in 1972. Caird won three Australian titles during her short career, in the 100 m hurdles in 1970 and 200 m hurdles in 1970-71. She retired from athletics after the München Olympics due to constant stomach pains that began to trouble her in 1969. It was later discovered that her pains were due to cancer and she underwent six operations and took three years to recover. Having married New Zealander Ross Jones three weeks before the 1972 Olympics, Caird eventually settled in New Zealand.