The 1983

UK Athletics Championships The UK Athletics Championships was an annual national championship in track and field for the United Kingdom, organised by the British Athletics Federation. The event incorporated the 1980 Olympic trials for the British Olympic team. The venue f ...

was the national championship in outdoor

track and field Track and field is a sport that includes athletic contests based on running, jumping, and throwing skills. The name is derived from where the sport takes place, a running track and a grass field for the throwing and some of the jumping events ...

for the United Kingdom held at

Meadowbank Stadium Meadowbank Stadium (officially the Meadowbank Sports Centre) is a multi-purpose sports facility located in the Meadowbank area of Edinburgh, Scotland. Built on the site of the earlier New Meadowbank and Old Meadowbank sports venues, it was ori ...

Edinburgh Edinburgh ( ; gd, Dùn Èideann ) is the capital city of Scotland and one of its 32 Council areas of Scotland, council areas. Historically part of the county of Midlothian (interchangeably Edinburghshire before 1921), it is located in Lothian ...

. It was the second time the event was held in the

Scottish Scottish usually refers to something of, from, or related to Scotland, including: *Scottish Gaelic, a Celtic Goidelic language of the Indo-European language family native to Scotland *Scottish English *Scottish national identity, the Scottish ide ...

city, following on from the

1978 UK Athletics Championships The 1978 UK Athletics Championships was the national championship in outdoor track and field for the United Kingdom held at Meadowbank Stadium, Edinburgh. It was the second edition of the competition limited to British athletes only, launched as ...

. The women's

5000 metres race walk The 5000 metres race walk is a racewalking event. The event is competed as a track race and was part of the athletics programme for men at the IAAF World Indoor Championships in Athletics until 1993. It is also an event in the World Masters Athle ...

was restored to the programme after an absence at the 1982 event. It was the seventh edition of the competition limited to British athletes only, launched as an alternative to the

AAA Championships The AAA Championships was an annual track and field competition organised by the Amateur Athletic Association of England. It was the foremost domestic athletics event in the United Kingdom during its lifetime, despite the existence of the officia ...

, which was open to foreign competitors. However, due to the fact that the calibre of national competition remained greater at the AAA event, the UK Championships this year were not considered the principal national championship event by some statisticians, such as the

National Union of Track Statisticians National may refer to: Common uses * Nation or country ** Nationality – a ''national'' is a person who is subject to a nation, regardless of whether the person has full rights as a citizen Places in the United States * National, Maryland, ce ...

(NUTS). Many of the athletes below also competed at the 1983 AAA Championships.UK Championships
GBR Athletics. Retrieved 2018-02-25.
NUTS. Retrieved 2018-02-25. Three athletes,

Steve Barry Steven ("Steve") John Barry (born 25 October 1950) is a retired Welsh race walker, born in Cardiff. A member of the Cardiff Amateur Athletic Club and Roath Walking Club, Barry won the gold medal in the 30 km road walk at the 1982 Commonwea ...

(men's

racewalk Racewalking, or race walking, is a long-distance discipline within the sport of athletics. Although a foot race, it is different from running in that one foot must appear to be in contact with the ground at all times. Race judges carefully asses ...

Martin Girvan Martin Girvan (born 17 April 1960) is a British former athlete who specialised in the hammer throw. He represented both Great Britain and Northern Ireland in international competition. Career Girvan had a personal best throw of 77.54m, set in W ...

(men's

hammer throw The hammer throw is one of the four throwing events in regular track and field competitions, along with the discus throw, shot put and javelin. The "hammer" used in this sport is not like any of the tools also called by that name. It consis ...

) and

Fatima Whitbread Fatima Whitbread (' Vedad; 3 March 1961) is a British retired javelin thrower. She broke the world record with a throw of in the qualifying round of the 1986 European Athletics Championships in Stuttgart, and became the first British athle ...

(women's

javelin throw The javelin throw is a track and field event where the javelin, a spear about in length, is thrown. The javelin thrower gains momentum by running within a predetermined area. Javelin throwing is an event of both the men's decathlon and the ...

) took their third straight UK titles.

Aston Moore Aston Llewellyn Moore (born 8 February 1956) is a male Jamaican-born former track and field athlete who competed for Great Britain, specializing in the triple jump event. He is currently an athletics coach, based in Birmingham, West Midlands. He ...

defended his men's

triple jump The triple jump, sometimes referred to as the hop, step and jump or the hop, skip and jump, is a track and field event, similar to the long jump. As a group, the two events are referred to as the "horizontal jumps". The competitor runs down th ...

title, as did women's

long jump The long jump is a track and field event in which athletes combine speed, strength and agility in an attempt to leap as far as possible from a takeoff point. Along with the triple jump, the two events that measure jumping for distance as a gr ...

Beverly Kinch Beverly "Bev" Kinch (born 14 January 1964) is an English former long jumper and sprinter. She held the UK long jump record for 29 years (1983–2012) with 6.90 metres. She is the 1983 Universiade Champion at 100 metres and the 1984 European ...

and hurdler Susan Morley.

Kathy Smallwood-Cook Kathryn Jane Cook (née Smallwood; born 3 May 1960) is a former elite athlete, specialising in sprint and sprint relays. She is one of the most successful female sprinters in British athletics history. She is three-times an Olympic bronze med ...

and Buster Watson achieved short sprint doubles and

Venissa Head Venissa Anne Head (born 1 September 1956 in Merthyr Tydfil) is a former international track and field athlete from Wales. Biography She went to secondary school at Cyfarthfa Castle Grammar School in Wales, and it was whilst there that she w ...

won both the women's

shot put The shot put is a track and field event involving "putting" (throwing) a heavy spherical ball—the ''shot''—as far as possible. The shot put competition for men has been a part of the modern Olympics since their revival in 1896, and women's ...

and

discus throw The discus throw (), also known as disc throw, is a track and field event in which an athlete throws a heavy disk (mathematics), disc—called a discus—in an attempt to mark a farther distance than their competitors. It is an classical antiqui ...

. The main international track and field competition for the United Kingdom that year was the inaugural

1983 World Championships in Athletics The 1st 1983 World Championships in Athletics were run under the auspices of the International Association of Athletics Federations and were held at the Olympic Stadium in Helsinki, Finland between 7 and 14 August 1983. Summary The overall med ...

. Women's UK champions Fatima Whitbread and Kathy Smallwood-Cook went on to reach the world podium.IAAF World Championships in Athletics
GBR Athletics. Retrieved 2018-03-09.

Medal summary

Men

Women

References

{{British championships in athletics UK Athletics Championships UK Outdoor Championships Athletics Outdoor Sports competitions in Edinburgh Athletics competitions in Scotland