Born in Algeria,[6][7][8] Mimoun fought military battles for France and the Western Allies during World War II.

In July 1943, he was sent to fight in the Italian Campaign, where he was a lance corporal in the 83rd combat engineers battalion of the Algerian 3rd infantry division of the French Expeditionary Corps commanded by Marshal Alphonse Juin.

On 28 January 1944, during the Battle of Monte Cassino, Mimoun was seriously injured by fragmentation in his left leg originating from shells fired by the Germans.

[21] The club arranged for him to work as a waiter in the café-bar of its facilities, which were then located in the Bois de Boulogne, and Mimoun would train in that park.

I won four Olympic medals while I was living in a small, two-room apartment (in the 19th arrondissement of Paris) without heating, shower and toilet."

[21] At the 1950 International Cross Country Championships he was runner-up to Belgium's Lucien Theys in the individual race, but retained the team title with France.

[26] He won the 5,000 m and 10,000 m gold medals at the 1951 Mediterranean Games and swept the French national championships 5,000 m, 10,000 m and cross country titles in both 1951 and 1952.

[26] The 1952 Helsinki Olympics saw by now a familiar sight: Zátopek claimed victory in the 5,000 m and 10,000 m races and Mimoun was the silver medallist in both.

[9] On 10 Oct 1955 in Algiers, Mimoun beat the French national record for the one hour run that had been held by Jean Bouin since 6 July 1913.

[9] Mimoun faltered in his first event at the 1956 Melbourne Olympics, managing only twelfth place in the 10,000 m final – 1 minute and 32.4 seconds behind Soviet winner Vladimir Kuts.

The day before the marathon, Mimoun received a telegram from his wife, Germaine, back in France telling him of the birth of their first child, a daughter called Olympe.

The mustachioed Mimoun had a white bandana, embroidered with his wife's initials, tied around the top of his head since the start of the race to protect himself from the sun's rays.

Mimoun surged forward in the uphill section of the course near the top of the hill, ran past Kelley and was solely in the lead before the halfway point of the marathon.

In the last quarter of the race, Mimoun removed his white bandana from his head and threw it onto the road surface, because according to him, it "felt like a ton".

Mimoun crossed the finish line in a time of 2:25:00, 1 minute and 32 seconds ahead of the runner-up Franjo Mihalić, in front of 110,000 spectators at the Melbourne Cricket Ground and before any other runner had entered the stadium.

Zátopek, who had undergone hernia surgery six weeks earlier, crossed the finishing line in sixth place, four minutes and thirty-four seconds after Mimoun.

[10] On his return home from Melbourne, there was a crowd of 15,000 people, a hero's welcome and a red carpet awaiting Mimoun at Paris' Orly Airport.

The day after he arrived home from Melbourne, he returned to the regular job that he had been doing since 1946 – as a waiter in a café-bar at the Racing Club de France [12][33][34] “I was sure Emil was there at my heels,” Mimoun told Sports Illustrated in 1972.

"[21] Mimoun did not compete in 1957 but returned in 1958 with a runner-up finish behind Stan Eldon in the individual race at the International Cross Country Championships and his first national marathon title.

His career at the top of the national and international ranks finished at that point but he continued to be a presence as a veteran runner.

[12][40][41][42][43] After Mimoun arrived back home from the 1956 Melbourne Olympics, he mooted the idea of creating a world-class sports training center in France.

After several failed attempts in previous years, he received a telephone call from Jacques Chirac to meet him in the Hôtel Matignon.

During that meeting in 1967, Chirac, who was then a senior civil servant working as Prime Minister Georges Pompidou's technical adviser, told Mimoun, "I have followed your entire (running) career and I like your idea of creating a (sports) training center in Corrèze."

[12] The sports training center – initially named Centre national d'entraînement sportif – located in the Corrèze village of Bugeat, was later renamed Espace 1000 Sources.

[43][46] In 1997, Mimoun protested in the strongest terms against the decision of the Comité national olympique et sportif français (CNOSF) to remove the Gallic rooster from the jerseys of French athletes.

[22][23] Mimoun's wife, Germaine, was born in Tulle, capital of the Corrèze département in the Limousin region in central France.

[11][51][52] Legion of Honour Others Alain Mimoun died at the age of 92 in the evening of 27 June 2013 at the Hôpital d'instruction des armées Bégin in Saint-Mandé, in the departement of Val-de-Marne in the Île-de-France region.

[56] On 6 July 2013, a minute's silence in honour of Mimoun's memory was held in front of 50,000 spectators during the 2013 edition of the Meeting Areva – an annual track and field event – that took place at the Stade de France.

It was held on Monday, 8 July 2013 at 10am local time, in the main courtyard of the Hôtel national des Invalides in Paris.

In his eulogy, Hollande said,"Today, it is all of France which is paying homage to Alain Mimoun, to the one who ran throughout his life on the tracks of stadiums in order to make the La Marseillaise resound, seeking glory for his country everywhere."