Sir Arthur Gold, who has died aged 85, was the last survivor of a once proud species: the great Corinthian sports administrator.

A former international high-jumper, a car franchiser in his day job, he contradicted the sharp image of that trade's popular perception. His aloof patrician demeanour hid a man

of warmth and integrity, and many bought into the ethics and morality on which he stood firm.

Inevitably some from a later era regarded his enduring belief that athletics was for relief, rather than reward, as anachronistic, but that was perhaps inevitable for a man whose high jump career spanned the leap from sand pit to foam bed.

He was the most influential British athletics official of his generation as well as a pioneering anti-drugs campaigner, but he was among the youngest to gain full qualification as a coach, while still competing internationally himself, and went on to lead the British athletics team at three Olympics, and England at three Commonwealth Games.

His off-track record embraced presidency of the European Athletics Association, honorary secretary of the British Amateur Athletics Board, chairmanship of the British Olympic Association, and presidency of both the Amateur Athletic Association and Counties Athletic Union. It was somehow fitting that he should die on Saturday, opening day of the Inter-counties Championships at Bedford. He had helped found the event in 1934, and last weekend was the first which he had missed.

His wife, Marion, whom he had married in 1942, predeceased him in January.

After 12 years as part-time, unpaid leader of the BAAB, he rejected the inaugural directorate of British athletics. The AAA had financial problems. ''I deemed it inopportune to take a salaried appointment with the board when one of its constituent members was having to dismiss employed staff,'' he recounted, and insisted the sport could not afford such a post. It was a

further 20 years before the advent of a single UK organisation, staffed by full-time employees. When it eventually went bust, the AAA, under Sir Arthur's significant influence, declined to bail it out.

The son of the late Mark and Leah Gold, he became a member of the world's oldest athletics club, London AC, and it made him president for its centenary season, 1962-63. The rangy, lean Arthur earned Great Britain selection when barely out of his teens, and was still competing at county level until 1960, when he suffered a severe bout of jaundice at the Rome Olympics.

He was chairman of the British Olympic Association from 1984-1992 and thereafter vice-president. He was leader of the Olympic athletics teams in 1968, 1972, and 1976, and chef de mission for the full Olympic contingent at the Winter and Summer Games of 1992, in Albertville and Barcelona.

He was proud to have continued the British tradition of forming opinion at international level. He was made a CBE in 1974, gained his knighthood a decade later, and became honorary life president of the EAA in 1988. While a member of the Sports Council (1980-88), he was one of the first to recognise the dangers of doping, and accepted a series of roles in an attempt to erradicate drugs.

He often observed that he had been in athletics so long that he had experienced: ''The Seven Ages of the High Jumper - at stage one, the official calls you by the number you are wearing. At stage two, he recognises you, and says, 'You're next!' Stage three, he uses your surname. Stage four, he uses your first name. Stage five, as you get older, you become 'Mr Gold'. Stage six, he advises gently, 'You're next, Sir.' Stage seven, he helps you out of the sand pit!''

The older he got, the more he seemed to relish committee intrigue. Last year, on his final inter-counties' appearance, it was observed by media doyen Trevor Frecknall that he had great stories to tell, and should write a book. The suggestion that he might profit from his service to the sport appalled him. ''I prefer to take them with me,'' he replied. And he did.

Sir Arthur Gold, CBE; born January 10, 1917, died May 25, 2002.

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