Berta Díaz

Berta Díaz’s original sporting passion was for baseball before turning to track athletics and, in a long career, she won more than 250 trophies and medals, set around 30 national records, and won 16 national titles. In addition, she was the US 80 metre hurdles champion three times, in 1955-56 and 1958, and was also third in the 220 yards in 1958.

Díaz made her international début at the 1954 Central American and Caribbean Games in Mexico City. She won two bronze medals, in the 100 metres and 4x100 relay. At the Pan American Games the following year, she became the first athlete from Cuba to win a Pan Am gold medal when she won the 60 metres in a world record 7.5 seconds. She also won silver in the 80 metre hurdles. At Melbourne in 1956, Díaz made history as the first female Cuban athlete to compete at the Olympic Games. She won a second Pan American Games gold in the 80 metre hurdles at Chicago in 1959 in a record 11.2. After failing to win a medal at the 1960 Roma Olympics, Díaz won both the hurdles and long jump gold medals, as well as a relay silver medal, at the 1962 Central American and Caribbean Games at Kingston, Jamaica.

Díaz was en route to San Juan, Puerto Rico for the 1966 Central American and Caribbean Games but was not allowed to disembark the ship Cerro Pelado following a decision made by the Cuban sports authorities. Two men had boarded the ship three miles off the Puerto Rico coast and told Díaz that she was a member of the CIA and would not be allowed in Puerto Rico. She, along with a baseball player, were returned to Cuba before. In 1968 Díaz went into exile in the United States and never returned to Cuba. She lived in Miami, and worked as a physical education teacher. She also worked as a therapist and massage therapist, with many of her clients having been fans of hers. Because of her fantastic career, she was chosen as one of the 100 most prominent figures in Cuban sporting history at the inauguration of Cuban Sports Hall of Fame in 2003. Following her death, she requested that her ashes be spread at the most southerly point of Key West, at the nearest point from the USA to Cuba.

Personal Best: 80H – 10.7 (1963).