Venue: Melbourne Cricket Ground 120,000. 19 competitors from -- nations.
Hopkins and the 19 year-old Balaș had both set world records during
the year and were favoured to battle for the gold medal, as they had for
the European title two years earlier where Hopkins won. Balaș was the
first of the favourites to have a failure, as she missed once at 1.67. In
all seven athletes attempted to beat Coachman’s Olympic record, but
only one athlete succeeded. McDaniel, whose best was 1.69, set a US
record, and thus became the first straddler to win the women’s title. She
then went straight to 1.76 and cleared the world record height on her
second attempt, before having three misses at 1.80. Allegedly, she had
cleared six feet (1.83) in practice during the summer, and looked capa-
ble of such heights in Melbourne.
United States
Great Britain
Soviet Union
Sweden
Romania
Austria
New Zealand
South Africa
Czechoslovakia
Australia
Canada
Germany