As this year's Olympics draw near in Rio de Janeiro, athletes from around the world are training hard to overcome the competition, just as Alice Coachman did for the 1948 Olympics in London. This inspirational nonfiction book by Heather Lang is a story of perseverance and unwavering ambition that follows Coachman on her journey from rural Georgia, where she overcame adversity both as a woman and as a black athlete, to her triumph in Wembly Stadium. With her strong determination and innate athletic talent, Alice raced her way to the top of the track and field world and, leaping over all hurdles in her path, went on to become the first African American woman to take home the gold medal. This amazing journey is complemented by Floyd Cooper's pastel illustrations that serve to represent Coachman's incredible struggles.

School Library Journal says: "Lang brings her subject's early years to life through small details... Cooper's pastels keep to a brown, grainy palette, recalling the Georgia dirt on which the track star ran as a child."

 

This book was recognised in the Intermediate category by the Keystone to Reading Book Award.

There are 40 pages in this book. This book was published 2012 by Boyds Mills Press .

Heather Lang , a former public-health attorney, was inspired by Alice Coachman's indomitable spirit. This is her first picture book. She lives in Lexington, Massachusetts. Carole Boston Weatherford is an award-winning poet and author of over two dozen books for young readers. She lives in High Point, North Carolina. Floyd Cooper has illustrated more than sixty books for children and young adults including Miss Crandall's School for Young Ladies & Little Mises of Color by Elizabeth Alexander and Marilyn Nelson and Tough Boy Sonatas by Curtis L. Crisler. He lives in Easton, Pennsylvania.