Colin Campbell

Sportsman Colin Campbell was one of only a handful of British athletes to compete at both the Summer and Winter Olympics, and the only one to come from the island of Jersey. Campbell first took up badminton when he was six-years-old, playing other racket sports until he turned 16. To improve his fitness he attended the local athletics club where he was selected to compete in the annual match against rival islanders from Guernsey. There he ran in a junior 440 yards race, something he had never done before, and surprised everyone with his speed. He was soon competing in races across the UK.

In 1966 Campbell was unlucky not to be selected for the British Empire and Commonwealth Games in Jamaica after suffering with an injury, but made up for it by earning a place on the Olympic team for the 1968 Games. In Mexico he reached the quarter-finals of the 400 metres and finished fifth with the British quartet in the 4 × 400 metres relay. Two years later he came eighth in the 800 metres at the 1970 Commonwealth Games in Edinburgh before qualifying for the same event at the 1972 München Olympics after breaking the British record. Campbell struggled, however, at the Games and did not progress from the heats. He returned to the Commonwealth Games in 1974 in New Zealand after beating Steve Ovett in a qualification race.

Shortly afterwards Campbell saw an advert asking for bobsleigh volunteers and took up the sport knowing that he had come to the end of his track career. He attended a training camp in the north of Italy where he eventually made the cut to represent Team GB at the 1976 Innsbruck Olympics. At the Games he finished 13th in the four-man event out of the 21 teams that took to the ice. After his retirement from competitive sport Campbell managed a local sports complex in addition to working in the banking sector. From 1979 to 1986 he served as the President of the Jersey Spartan Athletic Club, and he was inducted into the Jersey Sport Hall of Fame in 2018.

Personal Bests: 400 – 45.9 (1968); 800 – 1:46.1 (1972).