McRae wins sports book prize for second time

History was made in the William Hill Sports Book of the Year competition yesterday when Donald McRae became the first double winner in the 14-year history of an event informally known as "the Bookie".

It was a decision arrived at after what the chairman of the six-judge panel, John Gaustad, described as "one of the most disputatious discussions that we had".

The 41-year-old South African, whose study of boxing, Dark Trade, took the prize six years ago, repeated his success with In Black and White (Scribner, £18.99), an intertwined biography of two pioneering American champions, Joe Louis and Jesse Owens.

There had been speculation that this year would mark the first victory for that most traditional of sporting books, the autobiography. Three of the five short-listed entries fell into this category – the efforts of the former England cricket captain Mike Atherton, Opening Up (Hodder & Stoughton, £18.99), round-the-world yachtswoman, Ellen MacArthur's Taking On The World (Michael Joseph/ Penguin, £17.99), and the life story of the Sunderland and Ireland footballer Niall Quinn, co-written with Tom Humphries, Niall Quinn The Autobiography (Headline, £17.99).

The fifth entry – A Season with Verona (Secker & Warburg, £16.99) – came from Tim Parks, who was also creating history, having been short-listed for the Booker Prize in 1997.

But McRae earned another winner's prize, worth £15,000, for a work which Gaustad said had been praised for its scrupulous research and brilliant style.