Rosemarie Ackermann

Rosemarie Ackermann

Medal record
Women's athletics
Representing East Germany
Olympic Games
	1976 Montreal	High jump
European Championships
	1974 Rome	High jump
	1978 Prague	High jump

Rosemarie "Rosi" Ackermann (née Witschas; born 4 April 1952) is a German former high jumper, Olympic champion and multiple world record holder. In Berlin on 26 August 1977, she became the first female high jumper to clear a height of two metres.

Biography

She was born in Lohsa, Saxony. As Rosemarie Witschas, she represented East Germany in the 1972 Summer Olympics in Munich, finishing seventh behind Ulrike Meyfarth.

In 1974, at the European Championships in Rome, she won her first international title, setting a new world record of 1.95m. Later that year, she married handball player Manfred Ackermann, and assumed his surname. Two years later, when she won the gold medal at the 1976 Summer Olympics held in Montreal, Canada.

On 26 August, 1977, she became the first woman to clear 2.00 metres.

Ackermann competing at the Hochsprung mit Musik meeting, which she won in 1980.

In 1978, she lost her European title to Italian jumper Sara Simeoni. Ackermann retired from athletics after the 1980 Olympics, at which she placed fourth, just outside the medals.

Ackermann is the last female high jumper to set a world record using the straddle technique. She is also the last high jumper of either gender to win an Olympic gold medal in the high jump with that technique.

Competing for the sports club SC Cottbus, Ackerman was East German high jump champion in 1973, 1974, 1976, 1977, 1979 and 1980, and also won bronze medals in 1969 and 1972. She was the East German indoor champion in 1973, 1975, 1976, 1977 and 1980.

See also

• Female two metres club

External links

• Rosie Witschas-Ackermann at Olympics at Sports-Reference.com (archived)
• Video of Rosemarie Ackermann setting world record of two metres, Berlin, 26 August 1977 (British Pathé)