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Colin Jackson
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Colin Ray Jackson CBE (born 18 February 1967 in Cardiff, Wales) is a Welsh former sprint and hurdling athlete of Jamaican, Maroon, Taino, and Scottish ancestry, who now works as a sports commentator for athletics and television presenter predominantly for the BBC. Between 1993 and 2006 he held the world record in the 110m hurdles. In this event he won the silver medal at the 1988 Summer Olympics and gold medals at two World Championships, in 1993 and 1999.
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Encyclopedia
Colin Ray Jackson CBE (born 18 February 1967 in Cardiff, Wales) is a Welsh former sprint and hurdling athlete of Jamaican, Maroon, Taino, and Scottish ancestry, who now works as a sports commentator for athletics and television presenter predominantly for the BBC. Between 1993 and 2006 he held the world record in the 110m hurdles. In this event he won the silver medal at the 1988 Summer Olympics and gold medals at two World Championships, in 1993 and 1999. He also won four consecutive European Championship golds from 1990 to 2002.
Athletics career
Jackson attended Llanedeyrn High School playing football and cricket for the county and rugby union and basketball for his school.
Under coach and close friend Malcolm Arnold, he started out as a promising decathlete before switching to high hurdles. Following a silver medal in the 1986 Commonwealth Games, he won the 110m hurdles silver at the 1988 Olympic Games behind Roger Kingdom. Although his career as an active competitor in the event would last a further fifteen years, the last ten of these as world record holder, and see him twice crowned World Champion, twice Commonwealth Champion and four times European Champion, this would remain his only Olympic medal of any colour. In 1992 he was restricted by a minor injury and could only finish 7th, and in 1996 he came fourth and in 2000, fifth.
He set his World Record for the 110 metres hurdles on the 20 August 1993, winning his first World Championships gold medal in Stuttgart, Germany in 12.91s. The new mark shaved 0.01s off the previous record held by Kingdom and was to stand for nearly thirteen years, only being equalled by Liu Xiang in the 2004 Summer Olympics and finally beaten by the same man on 11 July 2006 at the Super Grand Prix in Lausanne with a time of 12.88s. However, Jackson remains sole holder of the indoor world record at the 60 metre hurdles with a time of 7.30 seconds set in Sindelfingen, Germany on 6 March 1994. His most extraordinary performance was when he became double European 60m champion (also in 1994) by winning the 60m flat race as well: his 60m dash time of 6.49s is still championship record, only 0.04s from the European record.
Jackson was a master of the "dip" - the skill of leaning forward at the end of a race to advance the position of the shoulders and improve times (and potentially positions). He was also renowned for being a particularly fast starter, which led to a great deal of success in 60m events.
He was the subject of controversy in 1998 when he decided to run for cash in Tokyo, Japan, rather than compete in the Commonwealth Games for Wales.
Six years after his first world title, Jackson regained his 110m hurdles crown at the 1999 Seville World Championships. This was to be his last gold medal at the very highest level, but he added a final, fourth successive European Championships gold in the 2002 Munich European Championships, extending an unbroken reign as European Champion stretching back to 1990.
Post retirement career
Since ending his professional career at the 2003 World Indoor Championships Jackson has been a coach, in athletics and other areas. He coached the swimmer Mark Foster until Foster's retirement in April 2006. Since late 2006, he has coached two of Great Britain's top Olympic prospects, 400m runner Timothy Benjamin and 400m hurdler Rhys Williams (athletics). He was also one of the members of the successful London 2012 Olympic bid team and is a key member of the BBC's televisions athletics coverage. However, he started his broadcasting career in 2004 by co-hosting, with Sally Gunnell, the BBC reality TV programme Born to Win.
Already the holder of the MBE that he received in 1990 for his services to athletics, in 1992 he was appointed CBE.
The English reggae band Aswad name-checked him on their 1994 hit song Shine: Him a floating like a butterfly, the hurdling man - Yes, me-a-chat about Colin Jackson.
Jackson has written three books, the first, The Young Track and Field Athlete, which was published in March 1996, by Dorling Kindersley, his second, Colin Jackson: The Autobiography, which was published in April 2004 by BBC Books and his last, Life's New Hurdles, which was published in March 2008 by Accent Press Ltd.
He is Director of multimedia production company Red Shoes Ltd, along with fellow Director and former BBC Exec Producer Richard Owen. Their clients include the IAAF and UEFA.
Colin Jackson took part in an episode of the BBC TV genealogy series Who Do You Think You Are?, broadcast in the UK on 20 September 2006. Of Jamaican descent, genetic tests showed his ancestry to be 55% African, 7% Native American (believed to be from Jamaican Maroon Ancestry on his father's side), and 38% European. His mother was born in Panama, the daughter of Richard Augustus Packer and Gladys McGowan Campbell. Gladys Campbell was from Jamaica, the daughter of a Scottish man Duncan Campbell and his housemaid Albertina Wallace .
In March 2007 Jackson starred as the 'hidden celebrity' in an episode of the award winning CBBC gameshow Hider in the House, hosted by JK and Joel.
In March 2008, an interview with The Voice newspaper, Jackson denied claims that he is gay, adding that he believed the stigma surrounding gay athletes to be a thing of the past.
In 2008, Jackson co-hosted with Louise Minchin, the Sunday morning show Sunday Life on BBC One.
Colin Jackson appeared in the BBC One documentary on July 31 2008 in attempt to find out what had made him such a talented athlete. A sample of his leg muscle showed that he had 25% super fast twitch fibres, when all previous athletes tested had only 2%. Family support was also thought to have been highly significant. Jamaicans are notable for the high level of support and encouragement they give their children in the area of sports. A notable clip showed a stadium in Jamaica with 30000 people cheering on children taking part in an average school sports meet. This included their peers, who seemed happy to cheer on their class mates who were 'good at sports'. Although Colin was brought up in the UK, he remembers his parents cheering on Don Quarrie in the 1976 Olympics, inspiring him to want to 'be like that'.
He is the brother of actress Suzanne Packer who plays Tess Bateman in the BBC One hospital drama Casualty.
Performance on Strictly Come Dancing
In 2005 he appeared as one of the celebrity contestants on the BBC TV series Strictly Come Dancing and, after a neck-and-neck final, came second with his dance partner Erin Boag, just losing out to cricketer Darren Gough. In 2006 Jackson became the first competitor who hadn't won the main series to win the Strictly Come Dancing Christmas special.
Bibliography
- Colin Jackson: The Autobiography (BBC Books, 2003)
External links
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