Christopher Chataway

Sir Christopher John Chataway (31 January 1931 – 19 January 2014) was a British middle- and long-distance runner, television news broadcaster, and Conservative politician.

Education

He was born in Chelsea, London, the son of James Denys Percival Chataway, OBE. He spent his childhood in the Anglo-Egyptian Sudan, as his father was a member of the Sudan Political Service. He was educated at Sherborne School — where he excelled at rugby, boxing and gymnastics but did not win a race until he was 16 — and Magdalen College, Oxford, where he gained a philosophy, politics and economics degree,Sir Chris Chataway: Former British athlete dies Chris Chataway dies at BBC Sport
Retrieved 19 January 2014 but his studies were outshone by his success on the athletics track as a long-distance runner.

Athletics career

Chataway had a short but distinguished athletics career. At the Helsinki Olympic Games of 1952, in the 5000 metres final, after being passed on the last bend by the Czech long-distance runner, Emil Zátopek, France's Alain Mimoun, and West Germany's Herbert Schade, Chataway's foot brushed the curb and he crashed headlong to the ground. Chataway managed to finish the race in fifth place. On leaving university he took an executive job with Guinness. When Sir Hugh Beaver of Guinness came up with the idea for the '' Guinness Book of Records'', it was Chataway who suggested his old university friends Norris and Ross McWhirter as editors, knowing of their liking for facts.

Chataway continued with his running. When Roger Bannister ran the first sub-four-minute mile on 6 May 1954 at Oxford University's Iffley Road Track, Chataway and Chris Brasher were his pacemakers. He finished in second place in the 5000 m at the European Athletics Championship of 1954, 12.2 seconds behind the winner Vladimir Kuts, but two weeks later turned the tables at a London v. Moscow athletics competition at White City, setting a world record time of 13 minutes 51.6 seconds. The contest was televised via the Eurovision network and made Chataway a sporting celebrity; that December he won the first BBC Sports Personality of the Year award. After competing in the 1956 Olympics, Chataway retired from international athletics, though he continued to race for Thames Hare and Hounds.

Broadcasting and politics

Soon after leaving Oxford with a degree in politics, philosophy and economics, he decided to aim for a political career. He thought a suitable job in the rapidly expanding world of television might help. He refused offers in sports TV and with panel and quiz shows but secured a job in August 1955 with ITN. He and Robin Day were its first two newscasters. After six months, when loss-making ITV cut back on its news output, Chataway switched to the BBC
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