Who is the youngest person to win an Olympic gold medal?
Perhaps a little surprisingly, the history of the Summer Olympics is awash with tales of plucky teenagers – and, in one unconfirmed report, a prepubescent boy – who have not only contested, but won, gold medals. The prepubescent boy in question was an unidentified local lad, recruited by Dutch rowers Françoise Brandt and Roelof Klein as a lightweight replacement for regular coxswain Hermanus Brockman in the final of the men’s coxed pairs at the 1900 Olympics in Paris. If he was, in fact, presented with gold medal, which is not altogether clear, he would almost certainly be the youngest gold medallist in Olympic history, for all that his name and age remain unknown.
The youngest confirmed Olympic gold medallist, though, was Marjorie Gestring, who was 13 years and 268 days old when she took top honours for the United States in the women’s 3-metre springboard diving at the 1936 Olympics in Berlin. Donna Elizabeth de Varona, who swam for the United States in the heats of the women’s 4 x 100-metre freestyle relay at the 1960 Olympics in Rome, was actually 139 days younger than Gestring, but did not receive a gold medal because she did not swim in the final.
Coincidentally, the youngest confirmed male Olympic gold medallist in history also participated at the 1960 Games and, like the mysterious youngster from six decades previously, was a coxswain in the men’s coxed pairs. However, his name was Klaus Zerta, he was 13 years and 283 years old and he represented the ‘United Team of Germany’.
Prior to the Games of the III Olympiad, held in St. Louis, Missouri in 1904, Olympic champions were awarded silver, rather than gold, medals. Similarly, runners-up were awarded bronze, rather than silver, medals and third-place finishers received no medals at all.
We have of course waxed lyrical about numerous sports on the site over the years, from ever popular sports like football and horse racing, to those more attuned to the big event like athletics (in the context of the Olympics etc). Of course most of us watch these events for a love of the sport, the effort it takes to get to the top, and the competitive nature of teams taking on one another to see who has what it takes. There can be no better example of that of late than the Euros. It was edge of your seat stuff especially when it got to the knock out stages.