03/09/2012

Olympians Celebrate Mary Peters's 40-Year Anniversary Of Gold

Some of the UK's Olympic heroes have travelled to Belfast to celebrate the 40th anniversary of Dame Mary Peters's gold medal victory.

Middle distance runner Dame Kelly Holmes, swimmer Duncan Goodhew, Coleraine rower Alan Campbell, boxer Hugh Russell and decathlete Daley Thompson attended a surprise event at Belfast City Airport where an airplane was named after the Northern Irish Olympian, and celebrated afterwards at the Grand Opera House.

The Flybe plane has a larger-than-life image of a triumphant Mary Peters winning gold in the women's pentathlon at the 1972 Munich Olympics.

Dame Peters, now 73, said last night: "I'm absolutely shaking with shock and surprise and joy. Sharing this with all my friends and - 40 years on - the gold medal still shines doesn't it?"

And Dame Kelly Holmes said the pentathlete had "brought real pride to Northern Ireland".

The Mary Peters track, where she once practised, is now undergoing an upgrade, to be finished by the end of 2012.

(NE)

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