After Dinner Speakers: Denise Lewis, Rich Hall, David Starkey

British athletics' golden girl Denise Lewis was the heptathlon champion at the 2000 Olympics in Sydney. She had already won a bronze in Atlanta in 1996, a world championship silver in 1997 and European championship and Commonwealth golds in 1998. But Sydney saw her achieve her ultimate dream. Her performance endeared her to the British public as she overcomes a painful Achilles injury to win gold. She had been a contender before, and narrowly failed to become the first woman since Liz McColgan in 1991 to win the award. She would also have followed in the footsteps of Mary Peters, who won both Olympic gold and Sports Personality in 1972 but was beaten into second place by some footballer. Denise Lewis is an icon of British, Womens and Black athletics and as such is universally admired.