BRITISH “SPORTSWOMAN OF THE YEAR,” AGED 13

Press, Volume XCVI, Issue 28473, 31 December 1957, Page 2

BRITISH “SPORTSWOMAN OF THE YEAR,” AGED 13

IBy SUSAN VAUGHAN]

LONDON. Diana Wilkinson, who, at the age of 13, has been voted Britain’s youngest-ever •’Sportswoman of the Year,” might not have achieved that distinction if she had not had two brothers to turn her into a tomboy. As a very small girl she did not play with dolls. Instead it was “Cowboys and Indians,” wrestling, jumping—and swimming. Diana was only seven when her brothers helped her to start swimming. “They convinced me you could not drown in 18 inches of water. Then I went out deep and could swim,” she says. | Now Miss Wilkinson—she is only sft 2in—streaks through the water. With her rhythmic crawl, she has become the fastest woman swimmer in Britain. Her record this year has been astonishing. She first achieved nation-wide fame last August when she became the first British woman to swim 100 yards in less than a minute. Her time of 59.35ec was one second inside the British senior record set up by Fearne Ewart in 1955. 19 Records

Then, in the national championships at Blackpool, curly-hairea dimple-cheeked Miss Wilkinson made a clean sweep of all the English and British women’s senior and junior records for 110 yards and 220 yards free-style. In five days, she set up 19 new records.

Diana is undoubtedly the swimmer of the year—the swimmer of any year since the war, for Britain. But she is not resting on her laurels. She aims to cut her 100 yards time to 58 seconds and then to beat the Olympic champion. Dawn Fraser, of Australia. In 1958, we should hear a great deal more of this high-school girl from Stockport, Cheshire. In July she will compete against the best

swimmers in the world at the Empire Games in Cardiff. In August, there will be the European Championships in Budapest. Bright Future

Diana might well become the first British woman to win the European 100 metres title; no-one in Europe has bettered her performances this year. The schoolgirl champion who says, “I aim at doing a faster time on every swim,” could achieve even greater things in 1960. If she continues at her present rate of progress, she will be Britain’s brightest prospect for a gold medal at the Olympic Games in Rome.