Lord Burghley winning the 400m hurdles at 1928 Olympics

The final of the 400 metres hurdles at the 1928 Amsterdam Olympic Games, showing Lord Burghley silhouetted against the concrete banking of the stadium racing his way to a gold medal victory. David George Brownlow Cecil, 6th Marquess of Exeter (1905 - 1981), Lord Burghley was an athlete, sports official and Conservative party politician. As an athlete, Burghley was a very keen practitioner who placed matchboxes on hurdles and practised knocking over the matchboxes with his lead foot without touching the hurdle. In 1927, his final year at Magdalene College, Cambridge, he amazed colleagues by sprinting around the Great Court at Trinity College in the time it took the college clock to toll 12 o'clock, inspiring the scene in the film Chariots of Fire (whose character Lord Andrew Lindsay is based upon Burghley) in which Harold Abrahams accomplishes the same feat. Lord Burghley did not allow his name to be used in the film because of the inaccurate historical depiction in the movie. There was never a race upon which Harold Abrahams beat Lord Burghley in this feat as the movie depicts. Burghley is also said to have set another unusual record by racing around the upper promenade deck of the Queen Mary in 57 seconds, dressed in everyday clothes. Burghley later served as president of the Amateur Athletic Association for 40 years, president of the International Amateur Athletic Federation for 30 years and as a member of the International Olympic Committee for 48 years. He was also chairman of the Organising Committee of the 1948 Summer Olympics

400m Aristocrat Burghley Exeter Hurdler Hurdles Marquess Medallist Medallists Sportsman Sportsmen

Features In These Collections

> Contributors > ILN