Sharon Colyear-Danville

Manchester-born Sharon Colyear´s father was African while her mother was Maltese. Sharon attended Parrs Wood grammar school, East Didsbury, where she started her athletics carer and at the age of 13 joined the Stretford Athletic Club. She went on to win the national 200 metres title at under-15 and under-17 in 1969 and 1970 respectively. Colyear left school in 1971 and days later won the WAAA senior 200 metres hurdles title in a UK record time 26.68. Just three days after that, she started a long banking career, after joining Barclays Bank as a junior clerk.

Colyear had to wait until 1976 for her next senior WAAA individual title when she won the 100 metres hurdles, a title she regained in 1978. She also enjoyed podium finishes in the 100 metres (1976-78) and long jump (1977). At the 1977 WAAA Championships, along with Donna Hartley, Sonia Lannaman, and Verona Elder, she established a world record 1:31.6 for the 4 x 200 metres relay.

On the international stage, Colyear competed at the 1976 and 1984 Olympics, reaching just one final, with the Great Britain 4 x100 relay squad at Montréal. Colyear won a 4 x100 relay gold and 100 metres hurdles bronze, however, at the 1978 Edmonton Commonwealth Games. She completed her set of medals that year with silver in the relay at the Europeans at Praha. Colyear went to study and train at Boston University, after which her athletic career improved considerably, and she went on to win 13 Greater Boston and New England titles. She was inducted into the University Hall of Fame in 1988 and, each year, the opening indoor track and field meet is dedicated to her.

In August 1981, Colyear married fellow athlete, and Boston University Hall of Famer, Bob Danville. They were both doing business studies at Boston University at the time, and later made the United States their home where she developed a real estate business in the Connecticut and Atlanta areas. She also found time to engage in her pastime of playing golf and got down to a single-figure handicap. One of their two sons, Neil, was an All-American track and field star. Colyear had earlier been engaged to Jamaican-born Roy Flowers, the drummer of the band Sweet Sensation who topped the UK charts in 1974 with Sad Sweet Dreamer.

Personal Bests: 100 – 11.35 (1977); 100H – 13.11 (1976).