Long gone are the days when a women's long-distance running event would be one of the most talked about events at the Summer Olympics. But the women's 3000m in LA in 1984 provided some of the most iconic images in Olympics history. Zola Budd, barefooted South African running for England going against American Mary Decker and Romanian Maricica Puica, with her iconic blonde hair. Budd's presence of the race at a time when South Africa was banned from the Olympics was incredibly controversial. The race was incredibly tight, as the Bud Greenspan footage below shows, until a 'tangle' between Budd and Decker left Decker on the infield and the partisan American crowd up in arms. Puica would run away with the race. The photos below capture the desolation of Decker
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