Finishing Together

The stadium in Barcelona was full and loud on the evening of 3 August 1992. Eight men settled into their blocks for the semi-final of the men's 400 metres. The top four would reach the Olympic final.

Among them was Derek Redmond, from Britain. He had waited years for this race. High up in the stands, as he always was, sat his father, Jim.

A body that kept breaking

Derek Redmond was one of the fastest men in Britain over one lap of the track. In 1985, when he was still only nineteen, he set a British record for the 400 metres. He was strong and quick, and many people thought he could one day win a medal for his country.

His body did not always agree. He had problems with his Achilles tendons, the thick cords at the back of the ankles, and with his hamstrings. Over the years he went through operation after operation.

At the 1988 Olympics in Seoul, his heel hurt so badly that he had to pull out just before his first race. He had to watch the Games he had trained for from the outside.

He did not give up. He worked his way back, and in 1991 he ran in the British team that won the 4 × 400 metres relay at the World Championships in Tokyo, beating the favourites from the United States. Now, in Barcelona, he felt strong at last. He won his first-round heat and his quarter-final. A place in the Olympic final seemed within reach.

His father had been with him the whole way, driving him to races when he was a boy and sitting through every disappointment.

The back straight

The gun fired. Derek got away cleanly and settled into his stride.

Then, about halfway down the back straight, something snapped in the back of his right leg. He felt it like a sharp blow. It was his hamstring tearing. He pulled up, hopped a few steps, and sank down onto one knee with his hand on the back of his thigh.

The other runners swept on around the bend and finished. The race was over.

Stretcher bearers began to come towards him. Derek waved them away. He got up and, hopping on one leg, began to make his way slowly along the track towards the finish line, in pain, his face twisted.

He later explained that he did not want his Olympics to end lying on the track. He had decided he would finish the race.

A man in a cap

Up in the stands, Jim Redmond had seen it all. He did not stop to think. He made his way down the steps, pushed past the security staff who tried to stop him, and climbed onto the track.

He caught up with his son on the final bend and put an arm around him.

Both men later told what was said. Jim told Derek that he did not have to do this. Derek said that he did, that he had to finish. His father answered that, in that case, they would finish it together.

Derek put his arm around his father's shoulders and wept. Jim held him up, waved away an official who came towards them, and the two of them went on, step by slow step.

By now the whole stadium had understood what was happening. Around sixty-five thousand people rose to their feet and cheered him home.

Derek Redmond crossed the finishing line.

What the results say

In the official results, Derek Redmond's name has no time beside it. Because he had been helped by another person, the record simply says he did not finish.

But the pictures from that evening were shown all around the world, and they have never stopped being shown. Years later, they were used in an Olympic campaign about what the Games are really for.

Not long after Barcelona, a surgeon told Derek that he would never run for his country again. It was hard news. He found new sports instead. He played basketball at a high level, and later he raced motorbikes. He went on to become a speaker, telling audiences about the day in Barcelona and what it taught him.

He often said that people remembered him for the race he did not win, and that he had made his peace with that. The thing he was proudest of was that he had finished.

A father in the stands

Jim Redmond lived for many more years. He was asked about that evening again and again, and he always said much the same thing: that his son needed him, and so he went.

Other men won medals in Barcelona, and earned them. But it is the picture of a son leaning on his father, finishing together, that many people carry with them from the Barcelona Olympics.

Want to read more?

The race and Derek Redmond's career are described in David Wallechinsky's The Complete Book of the Olympics, and his results are on Olympics.com, the official site of the International Olympic Committee. Derek and Jim Redmond told the story in many interviews over the years, and film of the race is easy to find.