Having been encouraged by her father-in-law to take up bowling at a men’s club in Cardiff in 1959, Janet Ackland went on to become Wales’ first world outdoor champion 29 years later.
The first of her many titles came in Llandrindod Wells in 1965. From there she went on to captain her country, win almost 100 caps indoors and outdoors, capture two British Isles titles, four Welsh crowns and compete at four successive Commonwealth Games. In 1994, in Victoria, British Colombia, she won a bronze medal with Ann Dainton in the Women’s Pairs.
A Welsh international since 1973, she struck bronze twice at the 1977 World Championships in Worthing in both the Pairs and Fours and then gold in Auckland in 1988 when she beat Ireland’s Margaret Johnson to the world singles title.
Janet Ackland (Bowls player) Born 19 December, 1938
