Tessa Sanderson

In 2018, Sanderson took part in Channel 5's reality series Celebrity 5 Go Barging.

She ran an academy in Newham, London that helped to find and train athletes to represent Britain in the 2012 Summer Olympics.

Sanderson took part in the Dancing on Ice goes Gold program on ITV, which was aired on 22 July 2012.

She also took part in a one-off exclusive BBC Red Button episode of EastEnders which was aired on 16 July 2012.

Sanderson organised and was associated with the Redbridge 10k on 24 July 2011, which was the first ever run in the Borough of Redbridge.

On 1 May 2010, Sanderson married Densign White, former Olympic judo athlete, at St. Paul's Cathedral in London. Her bridesmaids were her fellow Olympic teammates Sharron Davies, Kelly Holmes and Christine Ohuruogu. She and White are the parents of twins Cassius and Ruby Mae.

In September 2009, Sanderson registered her own charity sports academy carrying on her work alongside the established Newham Sports Academy. The name of the charity is the Tessa Sanderson Foundation and Academy. The charity is helping Sanderson to work on a wider basis to help other youngsters who are disabled and non disabled achieve their goals and creating a pathway and more opportunities not just in Newham but the wider areas of London and with a vision of a national roll out.

In April 2009, Sanderson again because of her work in the community made history by organising the first 10K road run to run through the Olympic Park offering the community and other visitors to Newham the Host Borough of the London 2012 Olympic and Paralympic Games a fantastic birds eye view of the Olympic 2012 athletics stadium. The Newham Classic 10K was so successful that it takes place annually and has led to other active running events for anyone such as the City of London West Ham Park Runs which takes place most Sunday mornings in West Ham Park in the East End of London.

In 2005, she took part in the one-off special, Strictly African Dancing, as part of the Africa Lives season on the BBC. She was voted into third place by the viewers.

Sanderson is an honorary graduate of the University of Wolverhampton and was made an Honorary Fellow of London South Bank University in 2004.

In 2004 Sanderson was awarded a Sunday Times Lifetime Achievement Award.

Sanderson served as Vice-Chairman of Sport England from 1999 to 2005.

In the 1990s, she worked as a sports reporter for Sky News, and appeared alongside Cilla Black as a co-host on ITV's Surprise Surprise.

Sanderson was appointed a Member of the Order of the British Empire (MBE) in the 1985 New Year's Honours, following her Olympic gold, raised to Officer (OBE) in the 1998 New Year's Honours for her charity work, and to Commander (CBE) in the 2004 New Year's Honours for her services to Sport England.

When Sanderson won the gold medal at the 1984 Summer Olympics in the javelin, becoming the first British woman ever to win Olympic gold in this event, her victory was quite unexpected. In the end, her career outlasted Whitbread's, and she competed at senior international level until 1996.

In 1984, Sanderson made an appearance on Bullseye.

Her best performance in the javelin was 73.58 m (241 ft 4  ⁄4  in) set in Edinburgh on 26 March 1983.

Starting in the late 1980s, she starred in a number of fitness videos alongside Derrick Evans.

Member of Wolverhampton & Bilston Athletic Club coached initially in the progressive days by John Moogan, and, subsequently by National Track and Field Coach Wilf Paish. Sanderson was the UK's leading javelin thrower from the mid-1970s, winning silver in the 1978 European championships and gold in the Commonwealth Games three times (1978, 1986, 1990), but was challenged during the 1980s by the up-and-coming Fatima Whitbread, with whom she shared a long-standing rivalry.

Theresa Ione "Tessa" Sanderson, CBE (born 14 March 1956) is an English former javelin thrower and heptathlete. A six-time Olympian in the javelin (1976–1996), she won the gold medal in 1984 for Great Britain, and in 1996 she became the second track and field athlete, after discus thrower Lia Manoliu, to compete at six Olympics. She is one of only five women in history to have thrown the javelin (old model) over 73 metres. She is the first black British woman to have won an Olympic gold medal.