The only British-born runner to win a gold medal in the Olympic marathon is Ken McArthur
By Duncan Mackay
The only British-born runner to win a gold medal in the Olympic marathon is Ken McArthur. He was born in Dervock, County Antrim, Northern Ireland, but emigrated to South Africa when he was 20. It was representing them that he won the marathon at Stockholm in 1912, his sixth successive victory at the distance.
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Duncan Mackay is the founding editor of insidethegames.biz, the world's leading and most influential independent Olympic news website. He was voted the British Sports Writer of the Year in 2004, British News Story of the Year in 2004 and British Sports Internet Reporter of the Year in 2009. Mackay is one of Britain's best-connected journalists and during the 16 years he worked at The Guardian and The Observer he regularly broke several major exclusive stories. He was also the only newspaper journalist in Britain to correctly predict that London would win its bid for the 2012 Olympic and Paralympic Games.
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