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Kriss AkabusiMBE

Akabusi at Hyde Park, 2012
Personal information
Full name	Kezie Uchechukwu Duru Akabusi
Nationality	British
Born	(1958-11-28) 28 November 1958 (age 66) Paddington, London, England
Height	1.85 m (6 ft 1 in)
Weight	81 kg (179 lb)
Sport
Sport	Track and field
Event(s)	Sprinting, hurdling
Medal record Men's athletics Representing  Great Britain Olympic Games 1984 Los Angeles 4x400 m relay 1992 Barcelona 400 m hurdles 1992 Barcelona 4x400 m relay World Championships 1991 Tokyo 4x400 m relay 1987 Rome 4x400 m relay 1991 Tokyo 400 m hurdles European Championships 1986 Stuttgart 4x400 m relay 1990 Split 400 m hurdles 1990 Split 4x400 m relay Representing  England Commonwealth Games 1990 Auckland 400 m hurdles

Kezie Uchechukwu Duru Akabusi, MBE (// ; born 28 November 1958), known as Kriss Akabusi, is a British broadcaster and former sprint and hurdling track and field athlete.

His first international successes were with the British 4×400 metres relay team, winning a silver medal at the 1984 Summer Olympics, golds at the 1986 Commonwealth Games and 1986 European Athletics Championships, and another silver at the 1987 World Championships in Athletics. He progressed individually in 400 metres hurdles from the late 1980s onwards, taking bronze at the 1989 IAAF World Cup. His time of 47.93 seconds to win the 1990 European Athletics Championships was a British record, and he also won gold at the 1990 Commonwealth Games.

He reached the peak of his career over the next two years, winning a hurdles bronze medal at the 1991 World Championships and anchoring the British team to a narrow victory over the American team in 2:57.53 minutes – a British record for the 4 × 400 m relay. He followed this with a British 400 m hurdles record of 47.82 seconds to take the bronze medal at the 1992 Barcelona Olympics, where he also won bronze with the 4×400 m relay team. Since retiring from athletics, he has worked as a television presenter and motivational speaker.

Early life

Born in Paddington to Nigerian parents who were studying in London, Akabusi would later be brought up in foster care with his brother Riba, after their parents returned to their country when he was four. Due to the outbreak of the Nigerian Civil War in 1967, Akabusi was unable to stay in contact with his parents, although he would later be reunited with his mother in his teens. She was determined that her son should settle in Nigeria, but while Akabusi was keen to make up for lost time with the rest of his family, he remained in the United Kingdom, eventually visiting the African nation when he was twenty-one. He attended Edmonton County School.

It was during this time that Akabusi, who is of Igbo heritage, changed his first name from 'Kezie' to 'Kriss'. He told an interviewer in 2002: "I decided to make a new start and part of that new start was to have a new name. I spelt my name with a 'K' because I didn't want to change my initials and I want to have some connections with my past. Kezie Akabusi was the connection to my past, but Kriss Akabusi is a connection with my future."

Military career

Akabusi joined the British Army in 1975, having a career in the Royal Corps of Signals before switching to the Army Physical Training Corps (as it was then called) in 1981. In 1990, when he was discharged into the reserves at the end of his army career he held the rank of Warrant Officer Class 2. It was during his tenure in the military that his potential in sports was discovered.

Athletics career

This section of a biography of a living person does not include any references or sources. Please help by adding reliable sources. Contentious material about living people that is unsourced or poorly sourced must be removed immediately. Find sources: "Kriss Akabusi" – news · newspapers · books · scholar · JSTOR (May 2019) (Learn how and when to remove this message)

In 1983, Akabusi embarked upon an athletics career, initially specialising in the 400 metres, before switching to the 400 metres hurdles in 1987. As a member of the British 4 × 400 m relay team, Akabusi won a silver medal at the 1984 Olympic Games in Los Angeles.

In 1990, Akabusi broke David Hemery's longstanding British 400 m hurdles record of 48.12 seconds on his way to a gold medal at the European Championships, with a time of 47.93 seconds. He also won the 400 m hurdles gold medal at that year's Commonwealth Games.

At the 1991 World Championships in Tokyo, Akabusi won the bronze medal in the 400 m hurdles and a gold medal as a member of the 4 x 400 relay team alongside Roger Black, Derek Redmond and John Regis, with Akabusi as anchor leg. At the start of the final lap, he took the baton in second place behind the American team, but eventually overtook American runner Antonio Pettigrew (who had won the 400 m individual event) on the final straight and crossed the line in first place to win the gold medal for Britain in a time of 2:57.53, a new British record.

At the 1992 Olympic Games in Barcelona Akabusi won the bronze medal in the 400 m hurdles, lowering his British record to 47.82 seconds, a time which still stands. This was the same race in which Kevin Young set the former world record. He also won a bronze in the 4 × 400 m relay.

Television work

Following his retirement from sports, Akabusi became a television presenter, working on several shows including Record Breakers (joining after the death of long-serving presenter Roy Castle in 1994) and The Big Breakfast, and regularly appeared as a panelist on many quiz shows such as A Question of Sport, They Think It's All Over and Through the Keyhole. In 1997 he appeared as a milkman on Last of the Summer Wine in the episode "There Goes the Groom".

Other appearances include: Come Dine with Me in 2011; in an Olympic-themed advert for Nature Valley cereal bars in 2012; a cameo in a red button episode of EastEnders; The Big Fat Quiz of The 80's; A League of Their Own; Never Mind The Buzzcocks and Backchat.

In 2017, Akabusi became a commentator on ITV's Bigheads with Jenny Powell. He also featured on the fifth series of Big Star's Little Star with his son Alanam. Since 2018 he has regularly appeared in adverts for Ladbrokes online betting.

Akabusi makes appearances on GB News reviewing papers

Honours

In 1991 it was announced that he would be appointed a Member of the Order of the British Empire by Queen Elizabeth II in recognition of his services to the country through athletics. In 1992 he was awarded an honorary degree from the University of Southampton.

Political views

In 1998, Akabusi discussed voting for the Conservative Party. In 2011, he supported the 'Yes' side in the Alternative Vote referendum. In August 2014, he was one of 200 public figures who signed a letter to The Guardian expressing their hope that Scotland would vote to remain part of the United Kingdom in September's referendum on that issue. In 2016, Akabusi stated on Twitter he backed Vote Leave and voted for Brexit.

International competitions

• 1984
  • Summer Olympics - Los Angeles, United States.
    • 4 x 400 m. relay silver medal
• 1986
  • Commonwealth Games - Edinburgh, Scotland.
    • 4 x 400 m. relay gold medal
• 1987
  • World Championships - Rome, Italy.
    • 4 x 400 m. relay silver medal
• 1989
  • IAAF World Cup - Barcelona, Spain.
    • 400 m. hurdles bronze medal
  • European Cup - Gateshead, England.
    • 400 m. hurdles gold medal
• 1990
  • Commonwealth Games - Auckland, New Zealand.
    • 400 m. hurdles gold medal
  • European Championships- Split, Yugoslavia.
    • 400 m. hurdles gold medal
• 1991
  • World Championships - Tokyo, Japan.
    • 400 m. hurdles bronze medal
    • 4 x 400 m. relay gold medal
  • European Cup - Frankfurt am Main, Germany.
    • 400 m. hurdles gold medal
• 1992
  • Summer Olympics: Barcelona, Spain.
    • 400 m. hurdles bronze medal
    • 4 × 400 m. relay bronze medal

References

1. ^ "News -- Kriss Akabusi: The extraordinary story of a great performer". nigeriaworld.com.
2. "Kriss Akabusi". IMDb. Retrieved 28 February 2022.
3. "Kriss Akabusi – Keynote Speaker". London Speaker Bureau. Retrieved 28 February 2022.
4. "Hire Kriss Akabusi | Speaker | Booking Agent NMP Live". nmplive.co.uk. Retrieved 9 May 2019.
5. "Athlete Kriss Akabusi: Help teenagers leaving care". BBC News. 9 March 2011.
6. "Kriss Akabusi talks of abuse". 19 January 2009. Retrieved 25 April 2019.
7. Edmonton County School pupils Retrieved 12 August 2018
8. "Meet Kriss Akabusi Footdown Member". footdown.com. Archived from the original on 14 July 2012.
9. "Kriss Akabusi: overcoming his own hurdles - British Heart Foundation". bhf.org.uk.
10. "Kriss Akabusi". www.hfma.org.uk. Retrieved 28 February 2022.
11. "Last of the Summer Wine: There Goes the Groom". 28 December 1997.
12. "On Demand". Channel 4.
13. Jim Shelley (18 July 2012). "Jim Shelley on best and worst of Olympics ads - Jim Shelley - Mirror Online". mirror.
14. "Theatre, dance, opera and cabaret reviews - The Stage". The Stage.
15. "BBC One - EastEnders, Billy's Olympic Nightmare". BBC.
16. "No. 52563". The London Gazette (Supplement). 14 June 1991. pp. 1–28.
17. "Kriss Akabusi on the Olympic medal that changed his life". International Olympic Committee. 5 March 2019. Retrieved 25 April 2019.
18. Charalambous, Anthi (1 November 1998). "How We Met: Kriss Akabusi and Roger Black". The Independent. Retrieved 18 December 2021.
19. "AV referendum: MPs would work harder, says Dyke". BBC News. 2 April 2011. Retrieved 18 December 2021.
20. "Celebrities' open letter to Scotland – full text and list of signatories". The Guardian. London. 7 August 2014. Retrieved 26 August 2014.
21. @krissakabusi (3 June 2016). "Maybe 1st publicly but ever closer union & loss of sovereignty has always been my concern from #EEC to #federalism x.com/nigelratty/sta…". Twitter.

External links

• United Kingdom Athletics profile for Kriss Akabusi
• Kriss Akabusi at IMDb
• Guardian interview, 12 August 2008
• London Student Newspaper coverage of the UCLU bar re-naming

• 1958 births
• Military personnel from the City of Westminster
• Living people
• People from Paddington
• Athletes from the City of Westminster
• English male hurdlers
• British male hurdlers
• English male sprinters
• British male sprinters
• English television presenters
• Olympic athletes for Great Britain
• Olympic silver medallists for Great Britain
• Olympic bronze medallists for Great Britain
• Olympic silver medalists in athletics (track and field)
• Olympic bronze medalists in athletics (track and field)
• Athletes (track and field) at the 1984 Summer Olympics
• Athletes (track and field) at the 1988 Summer Olympics
• Athletes (track and field) at the 1992 Summer Olympics
• Medalists at the 1984 Summer Olympics
• Medalists at the 1992 Summer Olympics
• English Olympic competitors
• Commonwealth Games gold medallists for England
• Commonwealth Games medallists in athletics
• Athletes (track and field) at the 1990 Commonwealth Games
• World Athletics Championships athletes for Great Britain
• World Athletics Championships medalists
• European Athletics Championships medalists
• Members of the Order of the British Empire
• Black British sportsmen
• English people of Nigerian descent
• Sportspeople of Nigerian descent
• English people of Igbo descent
• Igbo sportspeople
• People educated at Edmonton County School
• Royal Corps of Signals soldiers
• Royal Army Physical Training Corps soldiers
• World Athletics Championships winners
• 20th-century British Army personnel
• Medallists at the 1990 Commonwealth Games