One of the true “golden girls” of the swinging 60s, Mary Rand, who has died aged 86, emerged as the brightest British sporting star of her era when she became her nation’s first female gold medallist in Olympic athletics, taking long jump victory with a world record leap in the Tokyo games of 1964. She also won silver in the pentathlon and bronze in the sprint relay at the event, making her the first British athlete to have claimed three medals in one Olympic Games.
Her life was transformed after she broke the previous record on a wet day with a leap of 6.76 metres. On a cinder track, running into a headwind, her performance was spectacular. Always photogenic, Rand’s face became one of the most instantly recognisable as her every move was celebrated in newspapers and on television. Almost inevitably, she was named the BBC Sports Personality of the Year for 1964 and was made MBE 12 months later. Famously, the Rolling Stones lead singer Mick Jagger named her as the woman he would most like to take on a date.
Born in Wells, Somerset, Mary was brought up in a council house by her parents, Hilda, a nurse, and Eric Bignal, a chimney sweep and window cleaner, along with a brother and a number of half siblings. Mary’s prodigious natural athleticism had begun to catch the eye at an early age, leading to her being offered a scholarship at Millfield, the leading public school for sports, where she won All England Schools titles and broke the British record for the pentathlon aged only 17.
“I was always a tomboy,” Rand remembered. “I always followed my brothers, and I think I started out running around an orchard in Wells. I eventually went to the All England Schools. I got a scholarship to Millfield and, when I got there, I had a coach, and the rest is history.”
In 1958 she won her first major senior championship medal after being selected to represent England in the British Empire and Commonwealth Games in Cardiff. She took silver in the long jump, also finishing fifth in the high jump.
By her own admission Mary was “a little impetuous” agreeing to marry the Olympic rower Sid Rand three days after meeting him in 1961, with the two getting married only five weeks later. Her first daughter, Alison, was born 11 months later, leading her to be described as “a housewife” by some reporters, although another description calling her “Marilyn Monroe on spikes” may have been closer to the public’s perception, especially considering that to fund her training Rand had to keep working at her day job in the postal office of the Guinness factory in London, where she was happy enough to get a free half-pint of the black stuff every lunchtime.
Beloved by sports writers because of her readiness to talk about her career, she made sufficient progress as an athlete to arrive at the 1960 Rome Olympics among the favourites for a medal in the long jump, and her chances seemed bright after breaking the British record with a leap of 6.33m in the qualifying round. However, two no jumps put paid to her chances and she finished only ninth in the competition, also taking fourth in the 80-metres hurdles.
The press criticism that followed inspired Rand four years later. In Japan she shared a room with three other athletes, including Mary Peters and Ann Packer, who won the 800 metres six days after her friend’s victory. Packer vividly recalled Rand’s performances: “Mary was the most gifted athlete I ever saw. There never has been anything like her since, and I don’t think there will be again.”
After returning from Tokyo with her three medals, Rand continued to reign supreme domestically, winning six long jump WAAA (Women’s Amateur Athletic Association) titles, two high jump victories, two sprint hurdles and two pentathlon crowns, and she took the long jump gold medal at the 1966 Commonwealth Games in Kingston, Jamaica.
But an achilles tendon injury prevented her from defending the Olympic title in 1968. It was won by the Romanian Viorica Viscopoleanu, who broke Rand’s world long jump record in the high altitude conditions of Mexico City.
Rand’s first marriage ended in divorce and she moved to the US to be with Bill Toomey, the 1968 Olympic decathlon champion, whom she married in 1969. They settled in California and she had two more daughters, Samantha and Sarah, before their marriage also ended in divorce after 22 years. She was married for a third time, to John Reese, until his death in 2019.
She never returned to athletics and her home remained in the US, finally near Reno, Nevada. In the modern professional era, Rand would have made fortunes through advertising endorsements, but she never was able to capitalise on her fame because of the strict rules protecting the sport’s amateur status at the time.
In 2009, Rand was inducted into the England Athletics Hall of Fame. Prior to the 2012 Olympic Games in London, Rand visited the UK and her home city, where she was given a rapturous reception and awarded the freedom of Wells.
Her daughters survive her.