Beverley Whitfield

Whitfield was inducted into the International Swimming Hall of Fame in 1995. She died suddenly in 1996 at the age of 42.

This was Whitfield's career peak. She won both breaststroke titles the following year at the Australian Championships in times slower than she had recorded in Munich, but failed to win a medal at the 1973 World Aquatics Championships in Belgrade. Again in 1974, she won both events at the national championships in even slower times, but managed only a bronze in the 200-metre event in a time of 2 m 43.58 s and a silver in the medley relay. In 1975, she lost both of her national titles, and subsequently retired, admitting that she had lost her drive to compete.

She competed at the International Coca-Cola Meet at Crystal Palace in London, taking the bronze medal in the 200-metre breaststroke behind the Soviet Galina Prozumenshchikova, the world record holder. Late in 1971, Whitfields' rival Harrison came to Australia on a Churchill Fellowship and trained alongside her with Talbot. At the 1972 Australian Championships, Harrison took both the 100-metre and 200-metre breaststroke titles from Whitfield. Whitfield gradually improved her times in the lead up to the 1972 Summer Olympics during the Australian training camp in Scarborough, Queensland.

Whitfield proceeded to win both breaststroke titles at the 1970 Australian Championships in times of 1 m 18.5 s and 2 m 48 s respectively. She then toured South Africa with the national team before repeating the victories at the 1970 Commonwealth Games in Edinburgh in times of 1 m 17.4 s and 2 m 44.2 s respectively. She relegated England's Dorothy Harrison to silver in setting new Commonwealth records in both races. She added a third gold medal in the 4×100-metre medley relay, combining with Lynne Watson, Alyson Mabb and Denise Langford in 4 m 30.66 s. Whitfield continued her winning run in 1971, taking out the Australian Championships in both breaststroke events, although her times were slower than in Edinburgh. A third victory came with the New South Wales team in the medley relay.

In 1969, Gathercole was appointed as a swimming coach in Midland, Texas, forcing Whitfield's father to raise funds for her to travel to Texas and board with his family to continue her training for six months, where she sharpened her racing skills with more frequent racing in the more competitive American scene. Her improvement saw her place sixth and third in the 100-metre and 200-metrebreaststroke respectively at the US Championships in Louisville, Kentucky. On her return to Australia in November 1969, Gathercole arranged for her to train under Don Talbot. Whitfield found Talbot to be a hard-pushing coach: "I both hated and loved him. Terry Gathercole and Don Talbot had two different approaches. With Don I had to do all the strokes, the same number of repetitions and the same as everyone else was doing. I was exhausted."

At the age of 11, her uncle decided to send her to Sydney every weekend to receive training from Terry Gathercole, an Olympic medal-winning breaststroker who was regarded as Australia's foremost breaststroke coach. This involved long daytrips for her family to help her fulfill her dream, usually starting before daybreak. During school holidays, she boarded with Gathercole to train under him on a daily basis. In her first year under Gathercole, she finished third in the 100-metre breaststroke in her age group at the New South Wales Championships. Her improvement was rapid, and in 1968, she won the 100-metre and 200-metre breaststroke in the under-14 division at the State championships before placing second in her age group at the national titles in Hobart. This her progress to the open Australian Championships, which were the selection trials for the Olympics team. At the age of 14, she narrowly missed selection for the 1968 Summer Olympics in Mexico City, after finishing sixth and fourth in the 100-metre and 200-metre breaststroke respectively in the trials.

Whitfield showed a preference for the breaststroke from an early age, and would do a breaststroke kick when participating in freestyle activities. She showed a wider interest in sport while at Shellharbour Primary School, playing softball, netball, athletics and even playing cricket against her male classmates. However, this ended as she approached the end of her primary school years, with swimming coming to the fore. At the age of nine, Whitfield competed in the Primary School State Championships at North Sydney Pool, coming second to Kathy Whitlam, who happened to be the daughter of future Prime Minister of Australia Gough Whitlam. It was at the age of ten that Whitfield witnessed Australia's Dawn Fraser win her third consecutive 100-metre freestyle Olympic gold medal at the 1964 Summer Olympics, becoming the first Olympian to win an individual event three times consecutively, that forged her resolve to become an Olympian.

Beverley Joy Whitfield (15 June 1954 – 20 August 1996) was an Australian breaststroke swimmer of the 1970s, who won a gold medal in the 200-metre breaststroke at the 1972 Summer Olympics in Munich. She was coached by Terry Gathercole and Don Talbot.