Swell was extremely sad to hear of the untimely death of the former British athlete turned female bodybuilder Donna Hartley-Wass at the beginning of June.
As a child I remember cheering Donna on with my family watching the Commonwealth Games in the late 70s, and the Moscow Olympic Games in 1980. I was too young to have had any ‘feelings’ for her at that age, but she was the ‘Golden Girl’ of British athletics at the time, the Jessica Ennis of her era, a natural for the cameras as well as a world-class athlete.
As The Independent puts it in their obituary of Donna, With her long blonde hair and flashing smile, Hartley was an attractive as well as an accomplished performer. At a time when women's sprinting was dominated by runners from the Eastern bloc – many of whom were subsequently implicated in doping regimes – she was a Brit genuinely capable of mixing it.
She was awarded an MBE in 1979, and retired from athletics a year later. but I also remember her being a fixture on Superstars (a British TV show where sports stars would compete against each other in various events – swimming, cycling etc.). It was a huge show in its time, and Donna was still more than famous enough to be among those chosen for the show.
But what really makes Donna worth remembering here is what she decided to do next. In the mid-1980s, Donna Hartley became a bodybuilder, hardly a common career-move (more’s the pity!) for renowned UK female athletes.
Many within athletics were stunned to see pictures of Hartley's changed physique at the time, according to UK athletics historian Stan Greenberg.
And it wasn’t just those within her sport who were stunned. My abiding memory of Donna is an appearance she made on The Last Resort, the chat show that launched Jonathan Ross’ TV career, in the late 1980s.
There I was, mid-teens, as I always was on a Friday night, watching TV. I quite liked this new-style chat show and the irreverent host, and there was nothing better on, so as usual, I’d tuned into Channel 4 that night. Among the guests Jonathan promised us that night in his intro was the familiar name of Donna Hartley, but little did I suspect why exactly she was on the show, little did I suspect one of my formative female muscle experiences was about to unfold.
Out she came in a long black bathrobe that all but covered her entire body. She was a little older (obviously) than I remembered her, but also blonder, more glamorous, more tanned. She had a definite glow about her.
I’d only ever seen one other female bodybuilder actually move at that time, my first, Carolyn Cheshire, also on British TV, so by the time Donna appeared on my TV screen that night, I had already been converted. So the excitement I felt when Donna took off that bathrobe to reveal her muscular physique in all its glory was an excitement I had felt before, an excitement I have become accustomed to.
She proceeded to go through her routine right in front of the (for once) speechless host, even (if memory serves) climbing onto his desk at one point. Every move she made was accompanied by her gleaming smile. She looked so confident, so sexy.
While Jonathan sat there open-mouthed, while the audience gasped, Donna hit pose after pose. I was in teenage female muscle heaven.
After the routine, she sat down, grinning. She teased the obviously stunned Ross, kind of mockingly flirting with him as he recoiled. She enjoyed the shock she had caused. At no point did she seem anything less than totally and utterly comfortable with her own body. It was intoxicating.
All too quickly it was over and the show went to a commercial break. But in those days I recorded everything. And once the rest of my family had gone to bed that night, I watched Donna over and over again, and continued to do so for weeks and months (perhaps years) afterwards, officially retiring that VHS from family circulation and stashing it away with my growing collection of muscle magazines.
And amazingly, footage of her guest posing has survived, and thanks to ‘Vivian Gregson’ on youtube, FMS can share Donna with you as he remembers her from that night in a suburban South London home all those years ago…
Donna competed for only two years, finishing 3rd in the NABBA Britain and Universe contests in 1987, and winning the Britain title and finishing runner-up at the Universe the following year.
With her superior sporting genes and athletics background, she had the potential to be one of the greatest female bodybuilders this country has ever produced, but the sport, it turned out, wasn’t for her. You could only get into terrific shape twice a year because of the dieting and were on stage for 10 minutes, so I didn't think it worth the effort, she said later. But I learned a lot about nutrition.
It was during this time that she met and married her second husband, Bobby Knutt, a comedian and actor from UK TV who was himself quite famous at the time. When they celebrated their 25th anniversary in 2011, Bobby revealed he had been smitten instantly. She had the most beautifully shaped behind I’d ever seen, he recalled. Clearly a man of some taste.
Donna retired from the public eye, settled down with Bobby in the North of England, and went into hotel spa and leisure club management.
She was, by all accounts, a wonderful woman, and FMS’ thoughts go out to her husband, family and her friends.
I must admit that I am not familiar with her at all, but this is a really nice tribute.
ReplyDeleteThank you. It was written with a real sense of sadness at her passing, so I'm glad you thought that.
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