A protestant and a medal winner for Britain: Who is Mary Peters?

On a Friday, 21 July 1972… Belfast…

A car bomb exploded at the Smithfield bus stop at 14.10. Six minutes later, there was a huge explosion at the Brookvale Hotel on Brookvale Street. Seven minutes after the second explosion, a bomb would explode, this time at the train station on York Road. More than twenty explosions in eighty minutes... This was no ordinary Friday. As the name suggests, “Bloody Friday”…

In fact, that summer the Irish Republican Army (IRA) suspended its activities for a while. When negotiations began with the delegation appointed by the British Government, the IRA had compelling demands. They wanted British forces to leave Northern Ireland within three years and the detained members of the organization to be released immediately.

Lady Mary Elizabeth Peters (born 6 July 1939) is a Northern Irish former athlete and athletics administrator. She is best known as the 1972 Olympic champion in the pentathlon, for which she won the BBC Sports Personality of the Year Award. Peters was named as Lady Companion of the Order of the Garter on 27 February 2019. She was installed in St. George's Chapel, the chapel of the Order, on Garter Day, 17 June.

The British Government and the parties rejected these demands and left the table in anger. A few days later, the ceasefire was ended. The atrocity was imminent and it all happened in eighty minutes. Not one stone was left unturned on the streets of Belfast.

This was the view at the home of Olympic Champion Mary Peters, where she was impatiently waiting to return.

“One day my father came home. I remember sitting on the stairs and listening as he told my mother that we would now be living in Northern Ireland. “I went to my bed and sobbed.”

Mary Peters was born in Liverpool in 1939. However, when her father was assigned to Northern Ireland due to her work during the war, they packed up and moved to the city of Ballymena. Although little Mary was not very happy with this family activity at first, she would love her new environment in the following years.

Especially during their holidays here, getting involved in nature and running around all day long with her brother John would also be instrumental in awakening Mary's interest in athletics. However, a tragedy that the family experienced caused these holidays to end. Mary's mother died of cancer at a young age. After this tragic incident, Mary embraced athletics even more tightly. She would take refuge in sports to get away from all her sorrows.

Noticing his daughter's interest in athletics, her father also supported her in this path. So much so that the gift Mary received on her sixteenth birthday was two tons of sand dumped on the land near the house. Thus, Mary could easily practice long jump by herself. On her next birthday, a truck of cement was waiting for her. A shooting range would be built for shot put practices. The foundations laid that day would pave the way for the birth of a champion years later.

Mary started competing in the pentathlon at the 1958 Commonwealth Games. However, she was not very successful early in her career. The situation was the same in the Olympics. Although fourth place at the 1964 Rome Olympics didn't seem bad, ninth place in Mexico City in 1968 was annoying. As she would later admit, she could not be said to have fully devoted himself to her sport at that time in her career. However, the situation would change in the Commonwealth Games in 1970.

“I wanted to win for the first time in my career up to that point. I always had a fear inside me that "If I were successful, people would be jealous of me and their behavior towards me would change." I never felt like I was giving my 100 percent. But this time I gave it my hundred percent. “I realized that it was a great feeling to achieve something.”

Mary, who came first in shot put and pentathlon in the 1970 Commonwealth, tasted success, albeit late. She now had her sights set on the Olympics. Now thirty-three years old, Mary knew she had a one-time chance. In addition to her daily secretary job, some impossibilities prevented her from having a good preparation period. The bombs exploding all over the country did not help in this regard. These negativities would be overcome with the help of a sponsor and Mary would have the chance to train in California for six weeks. Mary was slowly taking on the mood of a winner. If everything went well, there was no reason why she couldn't win in Munich.

Mary's biggest rival in the pentathlon competition at the 1972 Munich Olympics was Heide Rosendahl, the darling of the host country. She was younger than Mary. She was a much more complete athlete. However, it would become clearer on the first day of the pentathlon competition that the favorites on paper did not mean much. Because Mary; She showed great performances in the 100 m hurdles, shot put, and high jump. At the end of the first day, she was an impressive 300 points ahead of her German rival. However, the remaining two competitions were the branches in which Rosendahl was better. Rosendahl was already an Olympic champion in the long jump. It was impossible to pass him. The calf's tail was going to be cut off in the 200 m race.

Mary had started the race very well. However, she couldn't continue it very well. Rosendahl stepped up a gear from the middle of the race and crossed the line ahead with a 10-meter difference. Mary was able to come in fourth place. She thought she missed a great opportunity. All athletes began to wait for the scores to be calculated and the results to be announced. After a while, Rosendahl approached Mary and congratulated her. Mary had won the Olympic championship by 10 points.

“Mary Peters is a protestant and won a medal for Britain. The IRA will be blamed for an attempt on her life. Her house will blow up soon!”

The happiness brought by the Olympic medal was replaced by an uneasy atmosphere with this phone call from the BBC channel. Because of this death threat to Mary, the officers advised her not to return to Belfast. But Mary had only one answer to all this:

"Nonsense!"

When she returned to Belfast she was greeted by a magnificent crowd at the airport. Two months after "Bloody Friday", people were smiling again in the city that was struggling with bloody protests. Whether he/she is a little child losing her mother or a whole city soaked in blood; Sports gave hope to people.