Smelling Of Roses - A Biography Of Jim Fox

Book Description: Ward Lock, London, 1980. Hard Cover. Book Condition: Very Good. Dust Jacket Condition: Very Good. First Edition. 144pp, illus. If Modern Pentathlon meant as much in Britain as it does in Hungary, Jim Fox would surely have followed Len Hutton, Stanley Matthews and Roger Bannister. to his knees on the red carpet of Buckingham Palace. Certainly it would have been no surprise to much of the rest of the world, in whose eyes Fox is the personification of British sport at its best. Fox rose above his peers in the most remarkable way, quite without rival or antagonism. He practised the Modern Pentathlon for 16 years with a dedication and determination quite phenomenal in the circumstances, finally leading Britain to victory and the team gold medal in the 1976 Montreal Olympics. This is a book about the event that is one of the most sadistically searching tests of an athlete's personality known to man. A five-day contest of riding, fencing, shooting, swimming and running, it pits the competitor against himself as he struggles to amass points awarded on the basis of an agreed international standard for each event. It is also about a man who `stands out among his peers as a unique individual - as a gentleman, as an athlete, as a person, as a performer.'.…