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Italian sprinter, Olympic gold medallist and holder of the 200m world record for nearly 17 years
Pietro Mennea, who has died aged 60 after a long illness, was one of only two Italians to win an Olympic sprint title, his tenacious finish in the 200m at Moscow in 1980 depriving Britain's Allan Wells of a sprint double. Mennea's victory matched that of Livio Berruti 20 years earlier in Rome, though Mennea went without the dark glasses that his compatriot always wore.
Mennea had made a quite sensational impact in the year before the Moscow Games. The World Student Games, now known as the Universiade, and held in the odd-numbered years, is pretty much a second-class citizen among championships, but Mennea enjoyed it. He won the 200m in 1973 and the 100m and 200m in 1975, and returned once more, in 1979, to attempt to win the 200m in Mexico City.
"I spoke to him before the event and it was clear he was there just for the world record. He was convinced he would break it – and to be honest he was head and shoulders above the rest of us," said Britain's Ainsley Bennett, who finished third in a personal best of 20.42sec, but was a full seven metres adrift of Mennea.
The Italian won in a time of 19.72, running the second 100m in just 9.38. It would stand as the world record for 16 years, nine months and 11 days, until Michael Johnson ran 19.66 at the US Olympic trials in 1996. Mennea's time remains the European 200m record.
Mennea, a student at various times of law, politics and PE, was born in Barletta, on the Adriatic coast of Italy. When he was young, the story goes, he would race against cars over a distance of 50 metres for wagers. It didn't take him long to make an impact on the track, becoming a double Italian champion at 19 and the following year winning a bronze medal at the 1972 Olympics at Munich, his first international championship.
Mennea competed in a total of five Olympic Games, carrying the Italian flag at the last, in 1988. He reached the 200m final in his first four Games, the first such achievement by a track athlete. "He was always the man to beat and I gave him the greatest respect," said Wells. "In the [1980] race, I knew I had to get ahead as far as possible without taking too much out of myself." Wells was two metres clear off the bend, but Mennea – always tigerish over the final 50 metres – wore the Scot down. "I read somewhere afterwards that his mum had said that she was pleased her son had beaten that 'big beast' – meaning me – but I took that as a compliment," said Wells.
Mennea also won a 400m relay bronze medal in the 1980 Games and a catalogue of other career titles including three gold medals in the European Championships. He courted retirement for several years before finally hanging up his spikes in 1988.
Mennea's career comes with provisos. The first is that his world record was run at an advantageous altitude (2,248 metres); but the record he beat, that of the American Tommie Smith, had been achieved at the same venue 11 years earlier. The second is that, after retiring, Mennea admitted taking supplements of human growth hormone, though he added that it was not illegal at the time.
After retiring from sprinting, Mennea practised as a lawyer and also worked for his local football team, Salernitana. From 1999 to 2004, he was a member of the European parliament, where he lobbied for independent dope-testing authorities in sport, which have progressively been introduced. In an interview with the newspaper Corriere della Serra last year, he vehemently argued against Rome bidding for the 2020 Games. "The real priorities of the country lie elsewhere," he said.
Mennea is survived by his wife, Manuela.
• Pietro Mennea, athlete, born 28 June 1952; died 21 March 2013