Donna Karen Fraser (born 7 November 1972) in Thornton Heath

Thornton Heath

Thornton Heath is a district of south London, England, in the London Borough of Croydon. It is situated south-southeast of Charing Cross.-Geography:...

, Croydon

Croydon

Croydon is a town in South London, England, located within the London Borough of Croydon to which it gives its name. It is situated south of Charing Cross...

 is an English

England

England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west; the Irish Sea is to the north west, the Celtic Sea to the south west, with the North Sea to the east and the English Channel to the south separating it from continental...

 athlete who mainly competed in the 200

200 metres

A 200 metres race is a sprint running event. On an outdoor 400 m track, the race begins on the curve and ends on the home straight, so a combination of techniques are needed to successfully run the race. A slightly shorter race, called the stadion and run on a straight track, was the first...

 and 400 metres

400 metres

The 400 metres, or 400 metre dash, is a common sprinting event in track and field competitions. It has been featured in the athletics programme at the Summer Olympics since 1896 . On a standard outdoor running track, it is exactly one lap around the track. Runners start in staggered positions and...

.

Career

An exceptional junior, she won six English Schools 200m titles (as well as a silver medal for the 4x100m at the 1990 World Junior Championships

1990 World Junior Championships in Athletics

The 3rd World Junior Championships in Athletics was the 1990 version of the World Junior Championships in Athletics. It was held in Plovdiv, Bulgaria.-Men:-Women:-Medals table:-External links:* at GBRathletics.com...

) before turning to the 400m in 1991 and becoming European Junior Champion at the distance the same year (also gaining a silver medal for the 4x100m). However, she didn't improve until 1996, when she began to concentrate on the 400m seriously and qualified for British teams in the major outdoor championships between 1996 and 1999. However, it was at the Sydney Olympics in 2000 that she finally showed the potential she had had as a junior when she clipped almost a second off her PB to finish 4th with a personal best time of 49.79 seconds, thanks in no small part to her training alongside Olympic Champion Cathy Freeman

Cathy Freeman

Catherine Astrid Salome "Cathy" Freeman, OAM is former Australian sprinter, who specialised in the 400 metres event. She became the Olympic champion for the women's 400 metres at the 2000 Summer Olympics, at which she lit the Olympic Flame.Freeman was the first ever Aboriginal...

 for that season.

A finalist in 1998 at the European Championships

European Championships in Athletics

The European Athletics Championships is an event organized by the European Athletic Association. It is organised every four years, the same year as the Commonwealth Games and between the Summer Olympic Games cycle. After the 2010 Championships in Barcelona, the European Championships will take...

 and Commonwealth Games

Commonwealth Games

The Commonwealth Games is an international, multi-sport event involving athletes from the Commonwealth of Nations. The event was first held in 1930 and takes place every four years....

 (where she took a bronze medal), she has also played an integral part of Britain's 4x400 relay team, taking medals at the World Championships in 2005, European Championships and Commowealth Games. She also won the BBC London

BBC London

BBC London is the BBC English Region producing local radio, television, teletext and online services in London and parts of the surrounding area. Its output includes the daily BBC London News and the weekly Politics Show on television, the BBC London 94.9 radio station and local coverage of the...

 Athlete of the Year Award for 2005. But her career after 2000 stalled due to a catalogue of injuries (including a torn achilles tendon

Achilles tendon

The Achilles tendon , also known as the calcaneal tendon or the tendo calcaneus, is a tendon of the posterior leg. It serves to attach the plantaris, gastrocnemius and soleus muscles to the calcaneus bone.- Anatomy :The Achilles is the tendonous extension of 3 muscles in the lower leg:...

).

At the 2007 World Championships in Athletics

2007 World Championships in Athletics

The 11th World Championships in Athletics, under the auspices of the International Association of Athletics Federations , were held at Nagai Stadium in Osaka, Japan from 24 August to 2 September 2007...

, Fraser went as part of the 4x400m relay squad. Despite not running in the final, she received a bronze medal, as she competed in the heats on the 2nd leg.

In September 2009, she announced that she was going to leave athletics to return to working full time at EDF Energy

EDF Energy

EDF Energy is an integrated energy company in the United Kingdom, with operations spanning electricity generation and the sale of gas and electricity to homes and businesses throughout the United Kingdom...

. Her final major race was the 400m at the British Grand Prix at Gateshead

Gateshead International Stadium

Gateshead International Stadium is a multi-purpose stadium, in Gateshead, Tyne and Wear, England. The stadium is primarily set up for athletics, with a running track, but it is home to Gateshead Thunder rugby league club, Gateshead Senators American Football and Gateshead FC. It has also held a...

, where she finished 7th with a time of 54.11 seconds. However she has continued to race for the Croydon Harriers

Croydon Harriers

Croydon Harriers is an athletics club based in Croydon, England. It was founded in 1920 and is located at Croydon Sports Arena....

, an athletics club based at the Croydon Sports Arena.

Major achievements

Year	Tournament	Venue	Result	Event
1990	World Junior Championships 1990 World Junior Championships in Athletics The 3rd World Junior Championships in Athletics was the 1990 version of the World Junior Championships in Athletics. It was held in Plovdiv, Bulgaria.-Men:-Women:-Medals table:-External links:* at GBRathletics.com...	Plovdiv Plovdiv Plovdiv is the second-largest city in Bulgaria after Sofia with a population of 338,153 inhabitants according to Census 2011. Plovdiv's history spans some 6,000 years, with traces of a Neolithic settlement dating to roughly 4000 BC; it is one of the oldest cities in Europe... , Bulgaria Bulgaria Bulgaria , officially the Republic of Bulgaria , is a parliamentary democracy within a unitary constitutional republic in Southeast Europe. The country borders Romania to the north, Serbia and Macedonia to the west, Greece and Turkey to the south, as well as the Black Sea to the east...	2nd	4x100 metres
1991	European Junior Championships	Thessaloniki Thessaloniki Thessaloniki , historically also known as Thessalonica, Salonika or Salonica, is the second-largest city in Greece and the capital of the region of Central Macedonia as well as the capital of the Decentralized Administration of Macedonia and Thrace... , Greece Greece Greece , officially the Hellenic Republic , and historically Hellas or the Republic of Greece in English, is a country in southeastern Europe....	1st	400 metres
			2nd	4x100 metres
1998	Commonwealth Games 1998 Commonwealth Games The 1998 XVI Commonwealth Games were held in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia from 11 September to 21 September 1998 making it the first Asian country to act as host and the last Commonwealth Games for the 20th century. A record 70 nations supplied 3638 athletes...	Kuala Lumpur Kuala Lumpur Kuala Lumpur is the capital and the second largest city in Malaysia by population. The city proper, making up an area of , has a population of 1.4 million as of 2010. Greater Kuala Lumpur, also known as the Klang Valley, is an urban agglomeration of 7.2 million... , Malaysia	3rd	400 metres
			3rd	4x100 metres
	European Championships 1998 European Championships in Athletics The 17th European Athletics Championships were held from 18 August to 23 August 1998 in Budapest, the capital city of Hungary.-Track:1990 |1994 |1998 |2002 |2006 |-Field:1990 |1994 |1998 |2002 |2006 |-Track:1990 |1994 |1998 |2002 |2006 |-Field:...	Budapest Budapest Budapest is the capital of Hungary. As the largest city of Hungary, it is the country's principal political, cultural, commercial, industrial, and transportation centre. In 2011, Budapest had 1,733,685 inhabitants, down from its 1989 peak of 2,113,645 due to suburbanization. The Budapest Commuter... , Hungary Hungary Hungary , officially the Republic of Hungary , is a landlocked country in Central Europe. It is situated in the Carpathian Basin and is bordered by Slovakia to the north, Ukraine and Romania to the east, Serbia and Croatia to the south, Slovenia to the southwest and Austria to the west. The...	3rd	4x400m relay
2000	Olympics Athletics at the 2000 Summer Olympics At the 2000 Summer Olympics in Sydney, 46 events in athletics were contested, 24 for men and 22 for women. There were a total number of 2134 participating athletes from 193 countries.-Men's events:...	Sydney Sydney Sydney is the most populous city in Australia and the state capital of New South Wales. Sydney is located on Australia's south-east coast of the Tasman Sea. As of June 2010, the greater metropolitan area had an approximate population of 4.6 million people... , Australia Australia Australia , officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country in the Southern Hemisphere comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous smaller islands in the Indian and Pacific Oceans. It is the world's sixth-largest country by total area...	4th	400 m
2005	European Indoor Championships 2005 European Indoor Athletics Championships The 28th European Athletics Indoor Championships were held at the Palacio de Deportes in Madrid, the capital city of Spain, from Friday, 4 March to Sunday, 6 March 2005.-Men:...	Madrid Madrid Madrid is the capital and largest city of Spain. The population of the city is roughly 3.3 million and the entire population of the Madrid metropolitan area is calculated to be 6.271 million. It is the third largest city in the European Union, after London and Berlin, and its metropolitan... , Spain Spain Spain , officially the Kingdom of Spain languages]] under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages. In each of these, Spain's official name is as follows:;;;;;;), is a country and member state of the European Union located in southwestern Europe on the Iberian Peninsula...	3rd	4x400m relay
	World Championships 2005 World Championships in Athletics The 10th World Championships in Athletics, under the auspices of the International Association of Athletics Federations , were held in the Olympic Stadium, Helsinki, Finland , the site of the first IAAF World Championships in 1983. One theme of the 2005 championships was paralympic sports, some of...	Helsinki Helsinki Helsinki is the capital and largest city in Finland. It is in the region of Uusimaa, located in southern Finland, on the shore of the Gulf of Finland, an arm of the Baltic Sea. The population of the city of Helsinki is , making it by far the most populous municipality in Finland. Helsinki is... , Finland Finland Finland , officially the Republic of Finland, is a Nordic country situated in the Fennoscandian region of Northern Europe. It is bordered by Sweden in the west, Norway in the north and Russia in the east, while Estonia lies to its south across the Gulf of Finland.Around 5.4 million people reside...	3rd	4x400m relay
2007	World Championships 2007 World Championships in Athletics The 11th World Championships in Athletics, under the auspices of the International Association of Athletics Federations , were held at Nagai Stadium in Osaka, Japan from 24 August to 2 September 2007...	Osaka Osaka is a city in the Kansai region of Japan's main island of Honshu, a designated city under the Local Autonomy Law, the capital city of Osaka Prefecture and also the biggest part of Keihanshin area, which is represented by three major cities of Japan, Kyoto, Osaka and Kobe... , Japan Japan Japan is an island nation in East Asia. Located in the Pacific Ocean, it lies to the east of the Sea of Japan, China, North Korea, South Korea and Russia, stretching from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north to the East China Sea and Taiwan in the south...	3rd	4x400m relay
2009	European Indoor Championships 2009 European Indoor Championships in Athletics The 30th European Athletics Indoor Championships was held in Turin, Italy, from Friday, 6 March to Sunday, 8 March 2009. The championships took place at the Oval Lingotto indoor arena which has a seating capacity of 6,600 people....	Turin Turin Turin is a city and major business and cultural centre in northern Italy, capital of the Piedmont region, located mainly on the left bank of the Po River and surrounded by the Alpine arch. The population of the city proper is 909,193 while the population of the urban area is estimated by Eurostat... , Italy Italy Italy , officially the Italian Republic languages]] under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages. In each of these, Italy's official name is as follows:;;;;;;;;), is a unitary parliamentary republic in South-Central Europe. To the north it borders France, Switzerland, Austria and...	2nd	4x400m relay

External links

• Donna Fraser, Olympics UK