Berit Berthelsen ( Tøien, 25 April 1944 – 13 February 2022) was a Norwegian athlete. She represented

IL Tyrving Idrettslaget Tyrving is a Norwegian sports club from Bærum, founded in 1922. It has sections for athletics and orienteering. It is named after Tyrfing in Norse mythology. IL Tyrving uses the stadium Nadderud stadion, and hosts the annual ''Tyrv ...

, as well as her national team.

Biography

Born in

Norway Norway, officially the Kingdom of Norway, is a Nordic countries, Nordic country located on the Scandinavian Peninsula in Northern Europe. The remote Arctic island of Jan Mayen and the archipelago of Svalbard also form part of the Kingdom of ...

, Berthelsen was educated at the

Norwegian School of Sport Sciences The Norwegian School of Sport Sciences (, NIH) is a public university located at Sognsvann in Oslo, Norway. It has the national responsibility for education and research related within sport sciences. It provides education at the Bachelor, Mast ...

. Berthelsen dominated

long jump The long jump is a track and field event in which athletes combine speed, strength and agility in an attempt to leap as far as possible from a takeoff point. Along with the triple jump, the two events that measure jumping for distance as a gr ...

and sprints events in the Nordic countries during the 1960s. At the Nordic Championships in 1965 she won five gold medals (100 m, 200 m, 400 m, long jump and relay). She won the European Indoor Games in long jump in 1967 and 1968, and won a

European Championships A European Championship is the top level international sports competition between European athletes or sports teams representing their respective countries or professional sports clubs. In the plural, the European Championships also refers t ...

bronze medal in 1969. She finished seventh at the

1964 Summer Olympics The , officially the and commonly known as Tokyo 1964 (), were an international multi-sport event held from 10 to 24 October 1964 in Tokyo, Japan. Tokyo had been awarded the organization of the 1940 Summer Olympics, but this honor was subseq ...

and ninth at the

1968 Summer Olympics The 1968 Summer Olympics (), officially known as the Games of the XIX Olympiad () and officially branded as Mexico 1968 (), were an international multi-sport event held from 12 to 27 October 1968, in Mexico City, Mexico. These were the first Ol ...

. In 1968 she also competed in

pentathlon A pentathlon is a contest featuring five events. The name is derived from Greek language, Greek: combining the words ''pente'' (five) and -''athlon'' (competition) (). The first pentathlon was documented in Ancient Greece and was part of the Anci ...

, finishing eighteenth. Throughout her career she won 35 national championships in individual events, and set 29 national records. Her long jump record of 6.56 metres was set on 10 September 1968 and stood for almost 41 years until Margrethe Renstrøm broke it on 1 August 2009, with a 6.64 m jump. She finished second behind

Mary Rand Mary Denise Rand, Member of the Order of the British Empire, MBE (née Bignal; born 10 February 1940) is a British former track and field athlete. She won the long jump at the 1964 Summer Olympics by breaking the world record, the first British ...

in the long jump event at the British

1964 WAAA Championships The 1964 WAAA Championships were the national track and field championships for women in the United Kingdom. The event was held at White City Stadium, London, on 4 July 1964. Results + Held on 30 May at Birmingham University See also ...

. Berthelsen won the British

WAAA Championships The WAAA Championships was an annual track and field competition organised by the Women's Amateur Athletic Association (WAAA) in England. It was the foremost domestic athletics event for women during its lifetime. Since 1880, the Amateur Athl ...

title at the 1966 WAAA Championships and the

1967 WAAA Championships The 1967 WAAA Championships were the national track and field championships for women in the United Kingdom. The event was held at White City Stadium, London, from 30 June to 1 July 1967. It was the last time the Championships were held at Wh ...

. She died on 13 February 2022, at the age of 77.

Achievements

References

External links

* * {{DEFAULTSORT:Berthelsen, Berit 1944 births 2022 deaths Norwegian female long jumpers Norwegian female sprinters Norwegian pentathletes Athletes (track and field) at the 1964 Summer Olympics Athletes (track and field) at the 1968 Summer Olympics Olympic athletes for Norway Sportspeople from Bærum Athletes from Akershus Norwegian School of Sport Sciences alumni European Athletics Championships medalists 20th-century Norwegian sportswomen