When Anita Lonsbrough raced to gold ahead of Wiltrud Urselmann and Barbara Göbel, the Germans, in the 200 metres breaststroke at the Foro Italico in Rome in 1960, she took time off work to do so. The result: Huddersfield Council, where she worked as a clerk, docked her wages. She was 19, the same age as Rebecca Adlington, Great Britain's newest women's swimming sensation, but that in terms of the fortune the Beijing gold medal-winner will enjoy, is where the similarity ends.

No lottery, no sponsorship in Lonsbrough's day - and the minute the swimming ended, it was straight back home to work. For the class of 1960, savouring the Olympic experience had nothing to do with getting round to see as many sports as possible and visiting the merchandisers, marketeers and a multitude of other distractions for the modern athlete. For Lonsbrough, it meant keeping alive the memories of a day that transformed her life.

Thirty years on, Lonsbrough returned to Rome as a journalist covering the city's Seven Hills International. Retracing the steps she took on her way to glory, we walked the length of the tunnel that connects indoor and outdoor pools. “It was magical,” she said. “The crowd was electric and I knew exactly where my mother was sitting. It still makes me tingle to think about it.”

A Commonwealth champion in 1958, Lonsbrough arrived at a pool in Waalwijk in the Netherlands in July 1959, saw the murkiness of the water (and was sure she had seen a frog) and resolved to swim “as hard as I could so I could get out as quickly as possible”. The world record fell to her in 2min 50.3sec. That off the back of four to five sessions a week and training in gyms where the most sophisticated technology was often a mat and a medicine ball. Sport was a hobby, coaching was part-time and sports science was yet to be discovered. A good steak was the beef of champions.

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In June, 1960, Urselmann clipped the mark to 2:50.2 in Aachen, Germany. The Games were held in Rome in September. “It was so thrilling,” Lonsbrough said. “Travel had an exotic feel and Rome was a glamorous city. We were on top of the world.”

On the blocks, she became mesmerised by a fly floating on the water. Like the frog in Waalwijk, she could think only about making sure she did not land on the fly when she dived in.

Out of the dive, Urselmann charged ahead, turning first at the 100 metres in 1min 20.2sec - her best 100 metres was 1:19.1. More prudent was Lonsbrough's split of 1:22.0, with Den Haan and Göbel, of East Germany, on 1:22.9.

Like Adlington yesterday Lonsbrough summoned her strength and believed that gold was within her grasp. Down the third length, she clawed back the deficit to Urselmann but the West German was still in the lead with some 15 metres to go, when the pride of Yorkshire sped by. Urselmann was not done yet. As Lonsbrough's stroke shortened, the German sensed a second chance and began to surge forward. Too late.

Lonsbrough had covered the second half of the race in 1:27.3, to Urselmann's 1:29.8, and as well as the gold medal, Lonsbrough had secured a 2:49.50 world record.

Lonsbrough was back in England within days of her triumph. Life had changed. She was invited as a special guest of honour to a Test match and became the first woman to win the BBC Sports Personality of the Year.

She swam on until the 1964 Games but abandoned breaststroke in favour of the medley which made its debut in Tokyo. Lonsbrough was the first woman to carry the flag for Britain at the opening ceremony. “As we approached the stadium you could hear the cheers from the crowds but walking through the tunnel it went very quiet and dark but then suddenly as we entered on to the track there was brightness and a deafening cheer. I almost felt I wanted to run back.”

She did no such thing, of course, and over the course of the Games, she met and fell in love with Hugh Porter, a world champion cyclist. They later married and are now in Beijing as journalists, he at the track, she at the pool.