First Olympic champion gets a bronze for 'just being there'

AUSTRALIA'S first Olympic champion, runner Edwin Flack, has been officially recognised as having won a third medal, in tennis doubles, more than 100 years after the event and despite failing to win a match.

AUSTRALIA'S first Olympic champion, runner Edwin Flack, has been officially recognised as having won a third medal, in tennis doubles, more than 100 years after the event and despite failing to win a match.

Flack was the first Australian to compete in an Olympics and has been widely lauded as the first 800m and 1500m champion. What has not been widely known until now is that the Melbourne runner also competed in the tennis doubles.

Flack and his English partner George Robertson lost the only match they played in Athens in 1896 after a bye in the first round. By pure luck of the six-team draw, the pair took third place.

The third placing was not recognised for Australia at the time, but the Australian Olympic Committee has now claimed the result.

Academic and Olympics researcher John McPherson said: "There were no bronze medals issued in the 1896 Olympics. They issued them retrospectively and that's why Flack's was missed. So he went to his death not knowing that he had won a bronze medal."

Associate Professor McPherson, a University of Wollongong PhD candidate, stumbled upon the discrepancy while researching for a radio documentary on the history of the Olympics.

"There was a lot of airtime to fill so I had to get into some pretty deep research," he told The Weekend Australian.

Associate Professor McPherson said he found an Australian Olympic history book that detailed Flack's third place but the corresponding medal tally did not match so he decided to do something about it. He sent submissions to the Australian Olympic Committee which were accepted by official historian Harry Gordon and the medal tally was amended.

"It was a fairly important amendment in terms of getting the record straight," he said.

"It (Flack's medal) was the first international placing for Australia in tennis and Australia went on to have an outstanding century in tennis."

The extra medal holds special significance to the current Olympic team as our competitors will be now competing for Australia's 400th summer medal -- not its 399th -- when they line up in Beijing in August.

The International Olympic Committee, however, does not allocate medals won by teams comprised of more than one nationality to the tally of each individual's country. The IOC's medal tallies for the first three Olympics include "mixed teams" as a separate entry from individual nations.

Associate Professor McPherson said Flack, who was born in 1873 and died in 1935, was a "half-decent" middle-distance runner who was working in London as an accountant when he decided to compete in Athens. "He was a relatively conservative accountant and he was very interested in the classical history of the Games. So he thought let's take holidays to the Olympic Games site."

As a result Flack became an Australian sporting legend.

However, even Associate Professor McPherson admits Flack's bronze was a bit "Stephen Bradburyesque", referring to the Olympic skater who won gold in 2002 after a pile-up among his competitors.

"Flack did a Bradbury," he said. "He simply got a medal for being there. But Bradbury wasn't a lame duck whereas Flack was. But we should acknowledge that he got a bronze medal."