The first Games to be shown on home television, although very few people actually owned sets, London also saw the first participation of Communist countries.

Seventeen-year-old American Bob Mathias won the decathlon only four months after taking up the sport and is still the youngest man to win an Olympic athletics event.

Holland's Fanny Blankers-Koen was the world-record holder in six disciplines but the rules stated she was allowed to enter only three individual track and field events. She won the 100m, 80m hurdles, 200m and 4x100m relay.

Karoly Takacs, a member of the Hungarian world champion pistol shooting team in 1938 when a grenade shattered the right hand he used to shoot, taught himself to shoot with his left and won a gold medal in the rapid-fire pistol event.

Denmark's Karen Hoff won the first women's canoeing event, while French concert pianist Micheline Ostermeyer won the shot put and the discus.

British gold medals: 3