Mhairi Spence
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| Nickname(s) | "Fencey" Spence | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Nationality | British | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Born |
31 August 1985 Inverness, Scotland |
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| Residence | Bath, Somerset | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Height | 1.71 m (5 ft 7 in) | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Weight | 70 kg (154 lb) | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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| Country |
 Great Britain Scotland
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| Sport | Modern Pentathlon | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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Medal record
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Mhairi Spence (born 31 August 1985) is a British modern pentathlete. She has won a series of medals at European and World Championships, but was not selected for the 2008 Summer Olympics by the British team due to the limited number of places available. After considering retiring in 2009, she returned to the sport and in 2012 she won gold medals in both the individual and the team events at the 2012 World Championships, and qualified to be chosen for the 2012 Summer Olympics.
Mhairi Spence was born in Inverness, Scotland, on 31 August 1985. She was a member of the Pony Club at an early age, competing in Tetrathlon from the age of ten. She was inspired to change disciplines by the British athletes competing in women's Modern Pentathlon when it made its début at the 2000 Summer Olympics in Sydney. She graduated from the University of Bath with a degree in Coach Education and Sports Development.
After seeing the 2000 Summer Olympics, she began training in fencing so that she could switch disciplines to Modern Pentathlon. After four weeks in the new sport, she won her class at the British Youth Championships. She competed at the 2006 Commonwealth Fencing Championships for Scotland, where she won the bronze medal. Women's Modern Pentathlon features five events, first fencing, then swimming, showjumping, and finally a discipline combining running and pistol shooting. She considers fencing to be her favourite discipline of Modern Pentathlon.
To qualify for an Olympic Games in Modern Pentathlon, athletes must reach a minimum standard. Prior to the 2008 Summer Olympics, Spence met the standard required to qualify for the Games, but as there are only two spots in each team for the sport she wasn't selected for the British team, Heather Fell and Katy Livingston were chosen instead. In 2009, she contemplated retiring from the sport, and returned to the family home in Scotland but following an early morning run in sub-zero temperatures, she decided she still had the passion to compete. She finished 3rd (or Bronze) at the 2011 World Modern Pentathlon World Cup. She finished in eight place at the 2011 World Modern Pentathlon Championships. At the first World Cup event of 2012, held in Charlotte, North Carolina, she took the silver medal in second place. She was leading going into the final event, the run/shoot discipline, but was overtaken by Lena Schoneborn, the reigning Olympic champion.
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