I was involved in music, acting, and some running, but my firm wish was to become a doctor. That was the formative age when I had decided on the pattern of my career.

It is the brain, not the heart or lungs, that is the critical organ.

Athletics is a luxury.

I was playing rugby and the other games English school children do, and there was an event which was planned in which races were run, and I simply just won these by a considerable margin

My introduction to track racing was through the background of cross country running, which is not a sport perhaps as popular in America as it is in England.

Your spikes, which were really quite long then, would catch the material of the track and your shoe would get heavier. I was simply filing them down and rubbing some graphite on the spikes, so that I thought I would run more effectively.

Sport, like all of life, is about taking your chances.