Jim Redmond, who created one of the most memorable moments in Olympic history during a men’s 400m race at the 1992 Games when he jumped onto the track to help his injured son Derek find his way across the finish line, died 14 Oct 2 in Northampton, UK. He was 81.
Derek Redmond announced the death on Instagram but gave no reason.
Derek Redmond, a world sprint champion from England, was considered by many to be the favorite to win a medal at the 1992 Barcelona Games.
In 1991 he was a member of the England men’s relay team that won gold at the World Championships against great odds. He ran the fastest time in his 400m qualifying round and won the quarterfinal race in Barcelona.
He then took his place on the fifth lane for the semifinals at the Olympic Stadium. Around 65,000 people watched, including his father, who sat in one of the upper rows.
Redmond got off to a good start and with 250 meters to go and three runners ahead, seemed poised to move forward. Suddenly he grabbed the back of his thigh and began to hop. He had torn his hamstring. Within seconds he was falling to the ground in pain.
Caregivers carefully surrounded him. He got up and began limping forward, determined to finish the race even though the rest of the runners had already crossed the finish line.
“It was all animal instinct,” he told the New York Times a few days after the race. “I always thought I could catch up with the other runners. I didn’t want to stop. I’m a very selfish person.”
A film crew spotted his father entering the track wearing a Nike cap, blue shorts and a white T-shirt that read, “Did you hug your feet today?” A companion tried to stop him, but he flew past him to reach his son.
“You don’t have to do this,” Derek recalled his father telling him. “You don’t have to do this to yourself.”
Derek insisted. He had to finish.
“Well then,” said Jim Redmond, “let’s finish this together.”
Other companions approached. Jim waved her off as well.
“I don’t speak Spanish,” he told reporters a few days later, “and I didn’t want to let anything stop me.”
When they reached the finish line, the crowd went wild. Camera crews surrounded them. And an intimate moment between a father and a son had become Olympic history in an instant.
By then, the 1992 Olympics had been criticized for its ostentatious excesses — US men’s basketball’s “Dream Team,” its relentless marketing — and persistent rumors of athletes taking performance-enhancing drugs. The story of Redmond helped at least somewhat to save the image of the games.
“It was all about helping him,” Jim Redmond told reporters in 2012. “The games had lost that direction. It was all about winning, winning, winning. We changed it by showing that we participate. We brought in another aspect without even planning it.”
Jim Redmond was born in Trinidad and Tobago. (Information on other details of his life was unavailable.) He moved to Britain when he was 15, part of a wave of people arriving from the former British colonies of Britain and Asia after the country relaxed its immigration rules in the 1950s.
He took a job at a box maker and later worked as a driver and then as a salesman for a meat processing company. Eventually he became self-employed in the same industry. He named his company J. Redmond & Son (although Derek never joined him).
Along with his son, he is survived by his wife Jennie; his daughter Karen Redmond-Scott; and three grandchildren.
Derek Redmond never returned to racing, but had a brief career in professional basketball before becoming a motivational speaker. Both he and his father were invited to take part in the ceremonial torch relay ahead of the London 2012 Olympics.
“We had a joke about it on the phone this morning,” Jim Redmond told reporters when the two were announced for the season. “He said, ‘You should invite me, and this time I’m going to help you.’ I said, ‘You’re probably right.’”