Italian 1980 Olympic 100m gold medalist and longtime world 200m record-holder, Pietro Mennea, died today in Rome at 61 after a long battle with a terminal illness.
Born in Barletta, Apulia, he started his long international athletic career in 1971, where he won the first of his 14 Italian outdoor titles in the 100/200.
He made his Olympic debut at the 1972 Summer Olympics in Munich, where he made the final of the 200 m, his strongest event. He crossed the line in third place, behind Valeri Borzov and Larry Black. Three more Olympic 200 metre finals would follow later in his career.
In 1979, he was 1st in the 100, and 2nd in the 200 behind Allan Wells of Great Britain in the European Cup. As a university student in political sciences, he then took part in the World University Games, which were held on the high-altitude track of Mexico City. His winning time in the 200, 19.72, was the new world record, beating the former world record by Tommie Smith set on the same track in the 1968 Summer Olympics.
Mennea's record held out for seventeen years (Mennea also held the low-altitude world record from 1980 to 1983: 19.96, set in his home town, Barletta), and was finally beaten by Michael Johnson at the US Trials for the 1996 Summer Olympics.
As of 1 March 2013 still only eight athletes recorded a better time over 200 metres than Mennea's world record.
