• April 17 down the years

A world record for Waitz

Grete Waitz broke the world record in the 1983 London Marathon © Getty Images

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1983
In welcome rain, Grete Waitz of Norway won the London Marathon for the first time, breaking her own world record like her countrywoman Ingrid Kristiansen on April 21, two years later and Paul Radcliffe on April 13, 2003. Britain's Mike Gratton improved on his third place the previous year by winning the men's race. At first, the electronic clock gave Waitz a time of 2 hours 25 minutes 28 seconds, which broke Alison Roe's world record by a single second. Then the organisers had to admit that the tenths of a second not shown on the clock had to be rounded up, so Waitz only equalled the New Zealander's mark. Embarrassment and agonising closeness. But after all that, it transpired that Roe had run on a course 150 metres too short, so Waitz got the record after all.

On the same day in 1994, Germany's Katrin Dörre became the first woman to win the London Marathon for the third consecutive year. Dionisio Cerón of Mexico won the men's race for the first of three years in a row. The race was blighted by the death of a 52-year male runner after ten miles. He was the third competitor to die in the event so far, including one the previous year.

At the Rotterdam Marathon in 1988, Belayneh Dinsamo set a world record of 2 hours 6 minutes 50 seconds.

1979
Jim Watt became WBC lightweight champion. Six weeks earlier, his manager Terry Lawless had guided Maurice Hope to the WBC light-middleweight, and now he cherry-picked another opponent for one of his stable of good but not great boxers. Alfredo Pitalúa was a Colombian with a spotty record against some very mediocre opposition. He was known to be flashy but not much of a boxer, and Lawless made sure the fight was in Glasgow and not Bogotà. Even so, Pitalúa was nearly too good for his man. For the first six rounds, he dazzled the Scot with his long reach and whirlwind attacks. Watt did well to slip a lot of punches, but he was caught time and again and nearly went down in the fifth. Then, in the seventh, Watt dodged another swing and landed a neat left hook that put Pitalúa down for a compulsory count: the turning point. Pitalúa didn't have the boxing nous to cope with Watt's southpaw jabs, and when he began to tire, it was soon all over. Watt hit him with two barrages in the 12th round, and the referee stopped it. Pitalúa won his next fight but lost the next six before retiring. Watt made four successful defences, including one against the stylish Howard Davis on June 7, 1980, then retired when he lost the title after stepping up in class on June 20, 1981.

1939
Joe Louis's record run of 26 world title defences in a row is padded out with opponents who shouldn't have been in the ring with him. The Bum of the Month Parade. One of them was poor Jack Roper, who didn't last very long tonight. It was the third title fight in a row that Louis ended in the first round, a record for any world champion. He later did it twice more, another unique achievement. Roper fought in the same kind of crouch as Louis, but his defence was similarly dodgy, and a few scruffy punches were enough. Roper lost 44 pro fights but stayed upright in most of the 78 films he acted in.

1983
A French driver won the French Grand Prix. Alain Prost won it for the first time in 1981 and the last in 1993. His six wins were a record for the race until Michael Schumacher won it for the seventh and eighth times in 2004 and 2006. In 1983, Nélson Piquet was second to Prost and went on to finish two points ahead of him at the top of the drivers' championship.

1967
Ring magazine's fight of the year. Italian underdog Nino Benvenuti was knocked down in the fourth round, but he'd done the same to Emile Griffith in the second, and he survived a cut nose to outbox the champion in the last five. A unanimous decision gave him Griffiths's world middleweight title. Griffith won it back later that year, and they met in a decider on March 3 the following year.

Hugo Porta played international rugby for 27 years © Getty Images

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1893
Marguerite Broquedis was born in France. She was runner-up in the mixed doubles at Wimbledon in 1914 but had greater success at home, where she was the singles champion in 1913, beating the defending champion who'd beaten her in the Finals of 1910 and 1911. Broquedis retained the title in 1914 by recovering from losing the first set to outlast a 14-year-old Suzanne Lenglen, who was about half her height. She was runner-up to a full-grown Lenglen in 1920. Broquedis had her biggest successes in 1912. She won the first World Clay Court Championships by beating Mieken Rieck, then at the Olympic Games she won bronze in the mixed doubles and above all gold in the singles. In the Final, she beat another German, Dora Köring, again after dropping the first set. She was French indoor champion six times from 1910 to 1927.

1999
That great fly-half Hugo Porta came on as a late substitute against a World XV and kicked a conversion in Argentina's 49-31 win. It was just a farewell gesture, and there's doubt as to whether it was an official international - but if it was, Porta was the oldest international rugby player of all time (47), with the longest international career (27 years)...

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