PT Usha

PT Usha, nicknamed the 'Payyoli Express', is an Indian sprinting legend and sports administrator who became the first Indian woman to reach an Olympic athletics final, missing bronze in the 400m hurdles at Los Angeles 1984 by one-hundredth of a second.

A single hundredth of a second cost P.T. Usha a bronze medal at the 1984 Los Angeles Olympics, a margin so small it required a photo finish to confirm — and yet that near-miss, rather than the five Asian Championships gold medals she won the following year, became the defining image of her career.. Discovered at age nine when she beat a much older school champion, she earned a place at one of Kerala's first sport-focused schools and came under the lifelong guidance of coach O.M. Nambiar, becoming India's youngest-ever Olympic sprinter at 16 when she competed at the 1980 Moscow Games. Usha broke through internationally at the 1982 Asian Games in New Delhi, winning silver in both the 100m and 200m, and won 400m gold with an Asian record at the 1983 Asian Track and Field Championships, a result that prompted Nambiar to move her into the 400m hurdles. At the 1984 Los Angeles Olympics, a fitter Usha became the first Indian woman to reach an Olympic athletics final, finishing fourth in the 400m hurdles just 1/100th of a second outside a bronze medal, a result that remains one of Indian athletics' most poignant near-misses. Usha went on to dominate Asian athletics for the rest of the decade, winning five gold medals at the 1985 Asian Championships in Jakarta to earn the title 'Asia's Sprint Queen,' and four golds and a silver at the 1986 Seoul Asian Games, cementing her status as the 'Golden Girl' of Indian sport. Nicknamed the 'Payyoli Express,' she competed at three Olympic Games in total (1980, 1984, 1988) and retired in 2000 with 23 Asian Games and Championships medals, 14 of them gold. She later founded the Usha School of Athletics in Kerala, which has produced further national medallists, and became the first woman and first Olympian to serve as President of the Indian Olympic Association in 2022, also being nominated to India's Rajya Sabha in the same year.

Graceful, long-striding sprinter and hurdler renowned for technique and sustained excellence across Asian competition

Widely regarded as India's greatest female track athlete, an inspiration to generations of Indian sportswomen and later a pioneering sports administrator

• First Indian woman to reach an Olympic athletics final (1984, 400m hurdles)
• 4x Asian Games gold (1986, Seoul)
• 23 Asian Games/Championships medals, 14 gold
• First woman President of the Indian Olympic Association (2022)
• Padma Shri recipient