ABSTRACT
This chapter focuses on the rise of women’s Olympic competition before World War I, focussing on the tennis stars Charlotte ‘Chattie’ Cooper-Sterry and Lottie Dod. While Cooper would become Britain’s first multiple female Olympic medallist in 1900, Dod would win her silver medal in 1908 as an archer, reflecting her status as Britain’s first great woman all-rounder. The chapter then considers how working class swimmer, Jane or ‘Jennie’, Fletcher won multiple medals in the inaugural female Olympic aquatic competitions in Stockholm in 1912. The chapter shows how women pioneered different technical aspects of their own disciplines, from training regimes, nutrition and clothing technology, to managing their roles as elite performers and mothers.
