Debbie Brill Athlete

Debbie Brill (born March 10, 1953 in Mission, British Columbia) is a Canadian high jump athlete who was the first North American woman to clear 6 feet, at age 16. Her unique reverse jumping style was called the "Brill Bend" and was developed independently about the same time as Dick Fosbury was developing the similar Fosbury Flop in the USA. This style of jumping revolutionized the event and is now almost exclusively the technique of elite high jumpers. Because Fosbury won the Gold medal at the 1968 Olympics, he is more often credited with the invention. She is an eleven-time national champion of Canada. Debbie has held the Canadian National High Jump record, both indoor (1.99 meters - 6' 6½ ") and outdoor (1.98 meters - 6' 6"), since 1969, establishing her first Canadian High Jump record when she was 16 years old. Her Canadian High Jump records remain unbroken. She was ranked in the top 8 female jumpers in the world for 12 years in a career that spanned 21 years, from 1967–1988. Debbie's jump, outdoors, of 1.98 m. in 1984 would have tied the 5th highest jump by a woman in an outdoors meet in the summer (August) of 2010. In 1979 Debbie won a gold medal in the World Cup athletics championship (the precursor to the World Athletics Championships) held in Montreal, Canada. Debbie was ranked number one in the world by Track and Field News going into the 1980 Olympics which Canada boycotted because of the U.S.S.R. 's military involvement in Afghanistan. In January 1982 Debbie established a World Indoor High Jump record of 1.99 meters in Edmonton, Alberta, 5 months after giving birth to her first son, Neil. She has a daughter, Katelin, and a son, Jacob. She is married to a physician, Dr. Douglas Coleman. In 1983, she was made an Officer of the Order of Canada in recognition for being "Canada's premier woman high-jumper".