Greatest Olympic Moments: Wilma Rudolph, Rome, 1960.
Wilma Rudolph was born premature (weighing 4.5 pounds), the 20th of 22 children, and as a child she suffered from all sorts of illnesses. The most severe of these was infantile paralysis, which rendered her left leg and foot useless and twisted and required her to wear a brace until age nine. At the 1960 Rome Olympics, Rudolph tied one world record and set another, eventually taking home three gold medals. Thereafter, she was known internationally as “the fastest woman in the world”.