January 15th 1948 saw the birth of one of Scotland's best long distance runners Ian Stewart.
Not your typical Scot, he was was born in Handsworth, Birmingham the third of six children of John and Mary Stewart. After the two eldest children (Carol and Peter) were born in Scotland, the family relocated from Musselburgh to Mary's native Birmingham in 1948, his father was Scottish and he chose to run for Scotland.Â
To many particularly of a certain age in Scotland, Ian Stewart is best remembered for his magnificent victory in the 5,000 metres at the 1970 Commonwealth Games in Edinburgh. In front of his "home" crowd at Meadowbank Stadium, the 21-year-old defeated Ian McCafferty and two legendary world distance stars, Kipchoge Keino and Ron Clarke in a European record time.Â
The year before on 11th June 1969 at Reading, Ian and his older brother Peter became the first brothers in the world to break the four minutes barrier for the one-mile in a race won by fellow Scotsman, Ian McCafferty. Ian Stewart clocked 3 mins 57.3 secs, four-tenths of a second ahead of Peter.Â
Although he brought home a bronze medal from the 1972 Olympic Games in Munich, Stewart was deeply disappointed at both his performance and how the final had been run. On 8th May 1977 Stewart produced arguably his most remarkable athletics performance when he got away from the field in the first mile to complete the Michelin ten miles Road race in Staffordshire in a time of 45 minutes 13 seconds. Because the time was so unusually fast, the race organisers remeasured the course and found it to be the correct distance.Â
Three of the siblings won European Athletics titles, surely a remarkable fete in itself. His sister, Mary, also born in Birmingham, won the gold medal in the 1500 metres at the 1977 European Indoor Championship in San Sebastián. She represented England and won a gold medal in the 1,500 metres event, at the 1978 Commonwealth Games in Edmonton, Alberta, Canada.
