Lee Evans
From AIDS Wiki
Lee Edward Evans (born 25 February 1947) is an American athlete, the winner of two gold medals at the 1968 Summer Olympics.
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Biography
Born in Madera, California, Evans was undefeated in high school and won his first AAU championship in 440 yd (402 m) in 1966, shortly after graduating. He repeated his win the next year and won AAU and NCAA 400 m titles in 1968.
Lee Evans achieved his first world record in 1966, as a member of the US national team which broke the 4 x 400 m relay record at Los Angeles, the first team to better 3 minutes (2:59.6) for the event. In next year he broke the 4 x 220 yd (201 m) relay world record at Fresno in a time of 1:22.1.
Evans won the 1968 Olympic trials with a world record 44.0 and demolished it in Olympic final, winning in time 43.86. Evans won a second gold as the anchorman on the 4 x 400 m relay team, setting another world record of 2:56.1. Both the times stood as a world record for 20 years.
After winning the AAU 400 m titles in 1969 and 1972, Evans finished only fourth in the 1972 Olympic trials, but was named a member of the 4 x 400 m relay team once more. However, the United States couldn't field a team because Vincent Matthews and Wayne Collett were suspended, for a demonstration at a medal ceremony like Tommie Smith and John Carlos in the previous Olympics. Evans became a professional after the 1972 season. He was reinstated as an amateur in 1980 and ran a 46.5 in one of his few appearances that year, at the age of thirty-three.
Evans is currently the head cross country/track & field coach at the University of South Alabama.
Quotes
- "I have been all over Africa for almost 30 years and when I first heard there was a new sexually transmitted disease epidemic I was alarmed and began looking for what the television said was everywhere. All I ever saw was more and more of the same diseases we saw in 1975, and it was obvious the increase was because of the worsening living conditions, and the pennies instead of dollars governments were spending on health care. Sure, I have seen TB wards at hospitals and lots of misery, but nobody except the media and the people living off AIDS money ever called that AIDS." (Bialy 2006)
- "Sometimes a very mixed bag of interests can become united for different reasons. I think that is what happened with the push to sell AIDS as a new, sexually transmitted disease that started in Africa and was the biggest health threat to the continent. All the people with the 'good intentions' of 'keeping poor, uncivilized, sex-crazed Africans from killing themselves (again)' could be comfortably in bed with sensationalist, racist media, ITT’s medical division, corrupt politicians and a WHO you told me was so broke it had no money for a malaria vaccine and could give only a few thousand to your research on antibiotic resistant bacteria even though you were working with the biggest name in the field." (Bialy 2006)
Documents and external links
References
- ↑ Bialy, Harvey, 2006. Interview with Lee Evans, 6 February 2006.
- ↑ Ibid.
Credit
 | This page uses content from the Lee_Evans_(athlete) article on Wikipedia, captured on 24 March 2006. The list of authors can be seen in the page history. As with the AIDS Wiki, the text of Wikipedia is available under the GNU Free Documentation License. |
