David Weir

David Weir was born in south London with a spinal cord transection that meant he never had the use of his legs. He was racing in a wheelchair by eight and was picked for the Atlanta Paralympics in 1996 at 17. It was a miserable experience. The stadium was half empty, the athletes were housed in poor conditions, and he came home without a medal and with the feeling that nobody cared. He stopped racing altogether.

For several years he drifted, working and drinking more than he should. Watching the Sydney Paralympics on television in 2000, with full stadiums and proper coverage, made him wonder what he had given up. He went back to the track at Kingsmeadow under the coach Jenny Archer, who had known him as a boy, and started again from nothing.

He won two medals in Athens in 2004, two golds in Beijing in 2008, and then, in London in 2012, four golds in eight days across the 800 metres, 1500 metres, 5000 metres and marathon, an extraordinary range for one athlete. The crowd chanted his name in the Mall.

He has won the London Marathon eight times, more than anyone else in any category, and has been open about depression and the anger he felt at the lack of support after the Games ended. He retired from track competition after Rio in 2016 but has kept racing marathons into his forties.