At the Mexico Olympics in 1968, this photograph of American athletes Tommie Smith and John Carlos standing on the victory podium with heads bowed and black-gloved fists raised in a Black Power salute in protest at racism in the USA, became the iconic image of the age.

In the fraught years since 1968, the weight of living through the aftermath put a heavy burden on the friendship of Carlos and Smith. In separate interviews with the Los Angeles Times it was revealed that they have barely spoken to each other since the early 1990s, despite living just a short drive apart in southern California. Smith described their relationship as “strained”. Carlos would call his former team-mate only “Mister Smith”.

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