My friend Judith Powell, who has died aged 90, was a physiotherapist who attended both London Olympics and whose clients included some of the leading figures of the British stage, screen and concert hall.
Early in her career Judith served as physiotherapist to the Korean Olympic team at the 1948 summer Olympics and was honoured at the 2012 London Olympics by the South Korean Olympic president at a special reception.
Her professional aptitude in diagnosis, stretching, discipline and remedial exercise to overcome difficulty and maximise performance was rigorously applied to her own life. Her intellectual flexibility and cultural appreciation enabled her to continue to practise for over half a century, assisting a wide range of patients including Sir William Walton, Mama Cass, the actor Dame Edith Evans, Pamela Travers (the creator of Mary Poppins) and the Duchess of Argyll.
Judith travelled widely with her companion, Leslie, and in later years learned to speak and write Arabic, studied French, English literature and the piano, embarked on several courses though the Open University, and became a member of the Chopin Society.
Judith had a genius for problem-solving, and an often startling gift for overcoming transport problems, on one occasion alighting from a car boot for evensong at an Oxfordshire church, to the considerable surprise of the visiting bishop.
At a memorable evening at the Reform Club in Pall Mall, Judith, then in her 80s, assisted a choking concert pianist, deftly flipping her over a marble balustrade and calmly administering a professional manoeuvre, liberating a pheasant bone and so saving another celebrated patient.
She continued to travel between her homes in Notting Hill, Rottingdean, Wantage and Paris with a momentum that belied her advancing years, and, in the final week of her life, re-enrolled for Latin classes.
Judith was born in Mottingham, south London, the youngest of four children. Her brother Fred, a marine commando, was killed on D-day in 1944. She attended Wadhurst college, East Sussex, excelling on the sports field and playing lacrosse for the south of England. After the war, she qualified as a physiotherapist at Bedford College.
Her marriage in 1949 to David Powell, a barrister, ended in divorce. She leaves three children, Marie, Judy and David, 14 grandchildren and four great-grandchildren.
