THE
OLYMPICSAND
THE FIGURES WHO
MADE THEM GREAT
INTRODUCTION
In ancient Greece, competitions were very popular. There were contests in painting, writing, and oratory, along with sports competitions in Olympia. Olympia was a small town in the region of Elis, on the banks of the river Alpheus, surrounded by olive groves. The buildings used for the games—the stadium, the hippodrome, the palestra, and the gymnasium—stood near the temple area. The most important temples were dedicated to Zeus and Hera. Inside the Temple of Zeus was an enormous statue of the god, created by Phidias. In the Temple of Hera, the laurel crowns for the winners were kept. After the coronation ceremony, their names were proclaimed with songs and poems throughout the country.Spectators arrived in large numbers from Asia Minor, Syria, or the Black Sea, although only men and unmarried women were allowed to attend the games. Every four years, heralds traveled across the country to announce a period of peace, known as the Olympic truce. Wars were suspended to allow inhabitants to travel to Olympia.The games also served for dating events. Some historians, such as Thucydides, Dionysius of Halicarnassus, Diodorus Siculus, and Pausanias, used them in this sense and often, next to the number of the Olympic year, they would place the name of the athlete who had won the olive crown in the footrace during that solemnity.By the end of the first century, there were eighteen events.
The marathon was the most popular, along with the chariot race. The latter took place in an arena called a hippodrome; the chariots, which could number up to sixty, were pulled by four horses that completed twelve laps of the track. The race was very bloody and often marred by serious accidents.Another important competition was the pentathlon, consisting of the discus throw, javelin throw, running, wrestling, and long jump. The most violent event, however, was pancratium, a mix of wrestling and boxing in which it was permitted to express one's strength with all possible techniques: punches, kicks, bites, knee strikes, scratches, elbow strikes, breaking the opponent's fingers, strangling...Legend tells of a certain Arrachion who managed to bite off a finger of the opponent who was strangling him, but that same finger, ending up in his throat, then suffocated him. He was nevertheless proclaimed the winner, posthumously.When the Romans conquered Greece in the 2nd century BC, the games had already been held for a long time and were extremely popular. But in 380 AD, the Edict of Thessalonica issued by the Christian Emperor Theodosius prohibited inhabitants from participating in pagan rites and forbade access to the temples. The temples thus fell into ruin and, after an earthquake and a flood, the city of Olympia was buried. After more than a thousand years, excavations carried out by a group of French archaeologists, followed a few decades later by a group of Germans, revealed the existence of many buried temples, sculptures, and vases. This discovery brought the city of Olympia and the games that once took place there back to general attention.
Among those who became passionate about the idea of the Olympics was the French Baron Pierre de Coubertin, a sportsman who practiced boxing, fencing, rowing, and equestrianism. With the idea of reviving the ancient games, he began to study the sports most widely practiced in various European countries. He became an admirer of rugby, played in the English town of the same name, where a Protestant pastor, Thomas Arnold, a professor at the local school, used it from the perspective of "sports pedagogy." De Coubertin also traveled to another English town, Much Wenlock, in Shropshire, where the Olympian Games were already being held. These had been started in 1850 by William Brookes and lasted four days in the month of July. De Coubertin met Brookes several times at the Raven Hotel, where many artifacts from that era are still preserved today.
De Coubertin’s project to launch international Olympic games, however, met many obstacles, in addition to incredulity, indifference, and political complications. For a long time, no official from international sports organizations thought of taking up his idea. But the Baron continued with tenacity to propose his project, even to the heads of state of various countries. When his plan was finally accepted, he sought out a group of professionals to organize the new games. The group later took the name International Olympic Committee. Today it is based in Lausanne and is assisted in its work by the national committees of various countries. The Olympic flag, represented by a white banner bearing five interlocking rings in the center—colored blue, black, red, green, and yellow, symbolizing the union of the five continents in the common sporting ideal—was designed by de Coubertin himself.
The first Olympiad of modern history was the one opened on March 25, 1896, in the Athens stadium, built by the merchant Georgios Averoff. There were athletes from fourteen countries competing in nine sports: athletics, cycling, fencing, gymnastics, shooting, swimming, tennis, weightlifting, and wrestling. Only men participated; women were considered too delicate to compete. The most popular sporting event continued to be, as it was in ancient times, the marathon, which commemorated the epic run of Philippides from Marathon to Athens to announce the Greek victory over the Persians.
It was not easy for athletes from various countries to reach Athens. The American James Connolly, traveling by ship from New York to Naples at his own expense, had taken seventeen days to arrive. But it was worth it, as he then won the jump and triple jump events, becoming the first official winner of the modern games.
The Italian Carlo Airoldi, who had even arrived in Athens on foot, was not as fortunate. Unfortunately, his specialty was the marathon, an event in which Greece had its own athlete. What could be done to prevent the latter from risking defeat? It was enough to declare that Airoldi was a "professional" and therefore could not be accepted into the games. Can you imagine the existence of professional athletes in the poor and underdeveloped Italy of the late 1800s? Thus, the race was won by Spiridon Louis, a shepherd and water carrier. When he entered the stadium, he was flanked by two Greek princes, sons of King George I of Greece, who ran the final stretch with him. As a prize for the victory, the king gave him a horse and a cart. Spiridon then returned to the mountains of Attica to lead the life of before. He came down from them again in 1936 to participate in the Berlin Olympics and to hand an olive branch to Adolf Hitler during the opening ceremony. A few weeks later, Greece was invaded by the Nazis. At the opposite extreme compared to Airoldi—which demonstrates the strangeness and arbitrariness of the acceptance rules at those Olympics—there was the case of an Irishman who happened to be in Athens as a tourist and decided to sign up at the last minute, just for the sake of it, and won both the singles and doubles tennis matches. The most curious race, however, was the swimming. Participants were taken out to sea on a boat. There, they dove into the cold seawater and tried to reach the shore as quickly as possible.
The new beginning of the games was crowned with success. Thus, the Olympic Committee decided to organize them every four years in different cities. In 1900, they were held in Paris on the occasion of the Universal Exhibition, and saw women's participation for the first time, although only in the sports of golf and tennis. The supremacy of the U.S. athletes, who participated at their own expense and won seventeen out of twenty-four track and field events, was extraordinary. In 1904, the Olympics were held in Saint Louis, in the United States, and saw the first case of doping involving the athlete Tom Hicks. In 1908, the Committee had assigned the games to Rome, but unfortunately, the eruption of Vesuvius forced the government to decline in order to allocate funds to the emergency instead. The games were thus hosted in London, and the desire of King Edward VII and Queen Alexandra to witness the start of the marathon from Windsor Castle was granted. To allow this, the marathon route was extended and brought to 42.195 kilometers, a length that has not changed since. At the London Olympics, a problem that would continue to resurface over the years became more acute: that of amateurism, threatened by professional compromises. In London, Italy won two gold medals. The marathon runner Dorando Pietri, who entered the stadium first, was disqualified because, having fallen to the ground, he had been helped to get back up.
In 1912, the Olympics took place in Stockholm, and Nordic athletes particularly distinguished themselves in long-distance athletic events. Italy won three gold medals. The American James Thorpe, baptized Jacobus Franciscus, born in the Indian territories of Sac and Fox in Oklahoma to an Irish father and an Indian mother, competed in the pentathlon—consisting then of the long jump, discus throw, javelin throw, 200-meter dash, and 1500-meter run. He won the gold medal in both the pentathlon and the decathlon.
The 1920 Olympics were held in Antwerp, and Italy won 13 gold medals there. In this Olympiad, the walker Ugo Frigerio and the fencer Nedo Nadi, captain of the fencing team, stood out. Nadi had participated in his first Olympics in 1912 in Stockholm when he was only eighteen years old and had won the gold medal in individual foil. In Antwerp, he won the team gold medal in épée and the gold medal in foil and saber, both individual and team.
After the Antwerp competition, the International Committee decided that the number of sports on snow and ice justified the creation of the Winter Olympics, separate from the summer ones. The first were held in Chamonix, France, in 1924. They included skiing, figure skating, and ice hockey. (Starting from 1992, however, a calendar was set so that the winter competition always takes place two years after the summer one).
In 1924, the Summer Olympics also took place in France, in Paris. On this occasion, twenty-six Olympic records and ten world records were broken. Italy won eight gold medals. A great protagonist of this sporting contest was the American swimmer J. Weissmuller, otherwise known as Tarzan, due to the films he starred in playing this role after retiring from competitive sports. In Paris, Weissmuller won three gold medals and swam under a minute in the 100-meter freestyle. He was born near Timișoara, in what was then the Austro-Hungarian Empire, and emigrated to the United States with his parents. During his career, he won five Olympic golds.
In 1928, the Olympics were held in Amsterdam. The Americans were led by future General MacArthur, and it was the year in which they won the least. Italy won seven gold medals. One of the great champions of these Amsterdam Olympics was Paavo Nurmi, a long-distance runner who had already won gold in 1920 and 1924, nicknamed "the Flying Finn." In 1932, in Los Angeles, Italy made a clean sweep of medals, winning twelve. Notable was the victory of Luigi Beccali in middle-distance running, where he also set a new record. Beccali would later go on to win the European title and the Italian title in 1934 and 1935, as well as bronze at the Berlin Olympics. Road cyclist Giuseppe Olmo won the gold medal in the team time trial along with Attilio Pavesi, who also won gold in the individual time trial.
In 1936, the Olympics were held in Berlin, while Adolf Hitler was in power, eager to show the strength of German athletes. Unfortunately for him, the star of the games was a Black runner from Ohio, James Cleveland Owens, known as Jesse, who won four gold medals in the 100 and 200 meters, the long jump, and the relay. Journalists had written that Hitler, present at the race, had left the stadium to avoid shaking his hand. However, Owens wrote in his autobiography that the Chancellor had given him a wave of greeting when he passed in front of the grandstand. Instead, it was President Roosevelt who snubbed him once he returned home, as he was concerned about the reaction of the Southern states on the eve of the elections. Owens helped make athletics popular in his country and had a great imitator, Carl Lewis, who in 1984 won in the same events. Across four Olympics, Lewis won nine gold medals, four of which were in the long jump. In Berlin, Italy won eight gold medals and stood out especially in soccer, whose players were under the guidance of Vittorio Pozzo.
The Olympics then resumed in 1948, after the war, and were held in London. Among the protagonists was the Black hurdler Harrison Dillard, nicknamed "Bones" because of his thinness. Dillard won two gold medals. Italy won eight gold medals. The most cheered among our representatives was Adolfo Consolini, winner of the gold in the discus throw. Among the women, the Dutch athlete Fanny Blankers-Koen stood out; a mother of two children, she won the 100 meters, 200 meters, 80-meter hurdles, and the 4x100 relay. With the creation of the Soviet bloc of Eastern European countries, a disparity arose. In those countries, athletes were all state employees, and therefore governments could send them en masse to the games without having to select amateurs as was done in the rest of the world. Thus, for forty years, the Soviets made a clean sweep of medals, even if these results did not then coincide with those of the World Championships and other international races.
The 1952 Olympics were held in Helsinki. While in 1896, in Athens, there were nine sports and fifty-two events, in Helsinki there were seventeen sports with one hundred and forty-nine events. At the Helsinki Games, twenty-nine Olympic records and nine world records were broken—a true record. Among the winners of the eight Italian gold medals were the Mangiarotti brothers in fencing, and Giuseppe Dordoni in the 50-kilometer walk. However, the one to win the most individual medals was the Czechoslovak long-distance runner Emil Zatopek, nicknamed the "Human Locomotive" because he panted heavily while running. Zatopek won three golds: in the 5,000 meters, the 10,000 meters, and the marathon. After the Prague Spring, the athlete—who supported the democratic wing of the Communist Party—was confined to working in a uranium mine.
In 1956, in Melbourne, the Games saw the success of Soviet athletes and the emergence of several Australian swimmers, including Iain Murray Rose, who won the gold medal in the 400-meter and 1500-meter freestyle. Dawn Fraser, on the other hand, won gold in the 100-meter freestyle and would repeat the feat in 1960 in Rome and 1964 in Tokyo. Italy won eight gold medals.
In 1960, the Olympics were held in Rome. They were the seventeenth Games, and the Italians won thirteen gold medals. Particularly significant was the victory of Livio Berruti in the 200-meter sprint. Other great protagonists were the German Hary in the 100 meters, the American W. Rudolph, the boxer Nino Benvenuti, and the Italian water polo team. But the athlete who entered into legend was the Ethiopian marathoner Abebe Bikila, who ran barefoot. Abebe was a police officer and part of Emperor Haile Selassie's bodyguard. It was the first time an African athlete had won an Olympiad, and for this reason, Bikila's medal became a symbol. The athlete won gold again in Tokyo four years later. Due to a car accident he was involved in some years later, Bikila was forced to live in a wheelchair for the rest of his life. He died at the age of forty-four.
In 1964, the Olympics took place in Tokyo. Among the most prominent athletes were the American Bob Hayes, who won two gold medals in the 100 meters and the 4x100 relay, and his compatriot Al Oerter, champion in the discus throw. The Soviet discus and shot put thrower Tamara Press, who had already won a gold medal in Rome, found herself facing accusations of using male hormones to become stronger. Abdon Pamich, from Fiume, who had already won the bronze medal in Rome, won the gold medal in the 50-kilometer walk despite a gastric crisis caused by a cold tea. Swimming champion Don Schollander won four gold medals in the 100 meters, 400 meters, 4x100 relay, and 4x200 relay. Klaus Dibiasi, not yet seventeen, won a silver medal in diving. Gymnast Franco Menichelli won it on the rings and took gold in floor exercise. In total, Italy earned nine gold medals in Tokyo.
In 1968, the Olympics were held in Mexico City, at an altitude of 2600 meters. Among the most prestigious names of the participating athletes were the Americans Hines, Smith, and Evans, who won respectively in the 100, 200, and 400-meter sprints. Klaus Dibiasi won gold and silver. The Kenyan Keino won in the 1500 meters, while his compatriot Temu won in the 10,000 meters. The Soviet Sanaev won the triple jump in a thrilling competition of great technical importance. American discus thrower Alfred Oerter, who was at his fourth victorious Olympiad, won the gold. The American basketball team dominated all the games. Incidentally, at the Olympics, not only are new records set, but new styles are also established. On October 20, 1968, in Mexico City, Dick Fosbury introduced a new style in the high jump, which consisted of clearing the bar "on one's back," with the head forward and the back arched. This style allowed him to achieve a result of 2.24 meters. However, the innovation was not immediately adopted by other athletes, who preferred to continue with the traditional jump—which was understandable, given they had spent years perfecting it. They are it was the young people who first began to perform it, and the jump, which was nicknamed the Fosbury Flop, is universally adopted today. Another athlete who introduced a new style, this time in the long jump, again at the Mexico Olympics, was Bob Beamon. On October 18, 1968, he shattered the previous record with a distance of 8.90 meters, landing almost outside the sand pit. What did the innovation consist of? In the rhythm of the approach and in the act of walking in the air after taking the leap. His record remained unbeaten for twenty-three years.
The 1972 Munich Olympics saw the triumph of the American swimmer Mark Spitz, who earned seven gold medals and set seven world records in the span of one week. At the Montreal Olympics in Canada in 1976, fourteen-year-old Romanian Nadia Comăneci achieved the maximum score in six events and became a public favorite. The 1980 Olympics were held in Moscow. It was the 22nd edition of the games, and one of the most unfortunate due to the American boycott following the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan—a boycott followed by many other countries, including Canada, Japan, China, and Arab nations. Italy decided to participate and won 15 medals, including Sara Simeoni in the high jump, Pietro Mennea in the 200 meters, and Maurizio Damilano in the 20-kilometer walk. In 1984, in Los Angeles, the boycott was repeated in reverse: the USSR and the Soviet bloc abstained. Italy returned home with a haul of 14 gold medals. Alberto Cova, in the 10,000 meters, was one of the winning athletes. Luciano Giovannetti, in shooting, repeated his Moscow triumph.
The 1988 Games were held in Seoul and saw the inclusion of baseball and taekwondo as demonstration sports. Surprisingly, in the latter discipline, Luigi D'Oriano won a silver medal. Gelindo Bordin won a gold medal in the marathon. The American Matt Biondi won five gold medals in swimming, and East German Kristin Otto won six in the same discipline. Ben Johnson, who had won the title in the 100 meters ahead of Carl Lewis, was disqualified for doping. In 1992, the Olympics were held in Barcelona with the participation of nearly ten thousand athletes—the largest turnout ever. In basketball, the team of Michael Jordan and Magic Johnson won. The Italian water polo team, the Settebello, won the gold medal.
The 1996 Olympics were held in Atlanta. To kick off the games with the lighting of the Olympic cauldron was the boxer Cassius Clay, who became Muhammad Ali. Italy won thirty-five medals, and Pierluigi Collina refereed the match between Argentina and Nigeria, which saw the latter's victory. A bomb caused the death of one person and the injury of many others. At the 2000 Sydney Olympics in Australia, British canoeist Steve Redgrave, after winning his race, also won the gold medal in the endurance event—the equestrian sport which, over the years, has become very popular in several countries. And speaking of endurance, that is, resistance, eighteen-year-old East German canoeist Birgit Fischer, who had won her first gold in Moscow in 1980, won gold here as well. She would win her eighth gold medal twenty-four years later at the 2004 Athens Games. A true record of longevity!
New Sports – Among the sports recently added to the Olympic Games are: ice dancing with skates, present in Innsbruck, Austria, in 1976; beach volleyball, incorporated in 1996 in Atlanta, USA; snowboard (or monoski), added in 1998 in Nagano, Japan. In Athens, in 2004, there were twenty-eight sports and three hundred and one events. At the 2008 Beijing Games, however, BMX (cross-country cycling) and the ten-kilometer swimming marathon were included.
PARALYMPICS
After World War II, games began to be held in Stoke Mandeville, England, for war veterans injured in combat and confined to wheelchairs. These games led to the first Paralympics for athletes with disabilities, which took place in Rome from September 18 to 25, 1960. That year, the sports present included basketball and fencing.
In 1976, the first Winter Paralympics were held in Sweden with a limited number of events. Today, however, there are more than twenty disciplines. In addition to athletics, cycling, equestrianism, sailing, shooting, and swimming, there is boccia (derived from the Latin bottia, meaning the game of bowls). It is played by people with cerebral palsy or muscular dystrophy. It became a Paralympic sport in 1984, and at the Beijing Olympics, eighty-eight athletes from nineteen different countries participated. The winners came from Brazil and Korea.
Goalball is for visually impaired athletes. It was designed in 1946 for the rehabilitation of veterans who had lost their sight in World War II. In 1980, it became a Paralympic sport. On a court similar to a volleyball court ($18 \times 9$ meters), participants must throw a ball containing bells inside toward a net as wide as the court, where a goalkeeper must block it.
Powerlifting, the lifting of a weighted barbell, consists of three exercises performed in different phases: the squat, the bench press, and finally the deadlift. In the Paralympic version, present since 1984, only the intermediate exercise—the bench press—is performed. The Chinese have distinguished themselves in both the men's and women's events of this sport. In Seoul, in 1988, where both the winter and summer games were held, tennis was also present. Starting from 1996 in Atlanta, rugby was added to the sports for those in wheelchairs.
A BRIEF HISTORY OF OLYMPIC SPORTS
Athletics (Track and Field)
The term "athletics" derives from the Greek word athlos, which means competition. In Greece, foot races existed even before the Olympics; they were endurance races that lasted for entire days, in which the winners received a substantial prize. There is also evidence of "athletics"—specifically running and high jumping—on the walls of the Egyptian tombs of Saqqara. In the Athens Olympics of 776 BC, the competition consisted of a foot race for the entire length of the stadium, to which other sporting specialties such as the discus, javelin, jump, and wrestling were added in later years. There were also athletic competitions in the Roman Games, but those were dominated mainly by chariot racing, wrestling, and gladiator combat.
It was starting from the 1896 Athens Olympics that athletics began to indicate a set of sporting events including running, the marathon, jumping, and throwing. The events were divided into track and field events, and it was from then that the disciplines still present today began to develop. In 1912, the International Association of Athletics Federations was created, which had the task of establishing standard rules that every country had to follow.
In 1928, women were admitted. Athletics is called "light" (atletica leggera in Italian) because, in the events that comprise it, the use of agility and muscle elasticity prevails over strength. Today, there are many sporting events that give life to athletics, which is divided into "light" (track and field) and "heavy" (weightlifting/combat sports).
BREVE STORIA DEGLI SPORT OLIMPICI
Atletica leggera (Athletics) - Il termine atletica deriva dalla parola greca 'athlos' che significa competizione. In Grecia, le gare a piedi esistevano già da prima delle Olimpiadi ed erano delle gare di resistenza che duravano dei giorni interi, nelle quali i vincitori ricevevano un premio sostanzioso. Anche sulle pareti delle tombe egiziane di Saqqara ci sono delle testimonianze di 'atletica', e più specificamente, di corse e di salti in alto. Nelle Olimpiadi di Atene del 776 a. C. la competizione consisteva in una corsa a piedi per tutta la lunghezza dello stadio, a cui, negli anni successivi, si sono aggiunte delle altre specialità sportive come il disco, il giavellotto, il salto e la lotta. Anche nei Giochi di Roma c'erano delle gare di atletica, ma in esse, a farla da padrone, erano soprattutto le corse delle bighe, la lotta e il combattimento dei gladiatori.
È a partire dalle Olimpiadi di Atene del 1896 che l'atletica è passata ad indicare l'insieme di eventi sportivi comprendenti la corsa, la maratona, il salto ed il lancio. Le gare erano divise fra gare su pista e su campo ed è da allora che hanno cominciato a svilupparsi le discipline presenti ancora oggi. Nel 1912 è stata poi creata l'Associazione Internazionale delle Federazioni di Atletica, che aveva il compito di stabilire delle regole standard che ogni paese doveva seguire. Nel 1928 vi sono state ammesse le donne. L'atletica leggera si chiama così perché nelle gare che la compongono l'impiego dell'agilità e dell'elasticità dei muscoli prevale sulla forza. Oggi sono molti gli eventi sportivi che danno vita all'atletica, che si divide in leggera e pesante.
Corsa, Corsa ad Ostacoli e Staffetta (Running, Hurdle Race, Relay) - La corsa si suddivide a sua volta in corsa piana di velocità pura, di velocità prolungata, di mezzofondo e a staffetta. Prima di diventare una disciplina sportiva, la corsa era praticata dall'uomo nella vita quotidiana. È diventata poi una disciplina tradizionale ed è senza dubbio la più antica forma di atletismo. Presso i romani essa era il fondamento dell'educazione militare. La corsa ad ostacoli è di lunghezza diversa. Nella corsa di 110 metri gli ostacoli hanno un'altezza di m. 1, 06, in quella di 200 metri essi hanno un'altezza di m. 0.762, in quella di 400 metri un'altezza di m. 0.914. In ciascuna di queste gare si collocano dieci ostacoli in ogni corsia, a una distanza costante l'uno dall'altro. Spesso la vittoria si conquista per una frazione di secondo.
La tecnica, ormai è molto evoluta, non solo nel modo di prendere il via, ma anche in quello di superare l'ostacolo in modo radente. Si deve riuscire a far rientrare l'ostacolo nella successione normale e ininterrotta dei passi di corsa, in modo da avere sempre lo stesso ritmo e la stessa velocità, prima, durante e dopo l'ostacolo. Le corse di mezzofondo si dividono in mezzofondo veloce, mezzofondo tra veloce e prolungato e mezzofondo prolungato, con distanze diverse. Le corse di velocità e di mezzofondo sono praticate anche a staffetta con squadre di quattro corridori che si passano di mano un testimonio simbolico. Ogni componente percorre una frazione del percorso lunga quanto quella degli altri e il bastoncino che fa da testimonio deve essere passato e non lanciato a chi lo riceve. L'ultimo della squadra deve tagliare il traguardo con il pegno in mano. Le gare più tipiche e diffuse sono la staffetta 4 per 100 e la staffetta 4 per 400.
Le gare su pista si svolgono su distanze che vanno dai 100 metri ai 10.000 metri, con le gare dei 400 metri a ostacoli e con la corsa siepi di 3000 metri.
Maratona (Marathon) – Questa corsa di resistenza era stata istituita nelle prime Olimpiadi moderne per rievocare l'impresa di Filippide. Si corre all'aperto, su strade maestre, anche se la partenza e l'arrivo sono in un luogo chiuso.
Race Walk (Marcia) – It is said that the beginning of this sport dates back to a practice carried out centuries ago by English aristocrats, of having a servant run in front of their sedan chairs. It seems it was also their habit to egg the valets on against each other, then bet on which one went faster. When this practice became a sport, the lengths of the middle distance were established between 5 and 20 kilometers, and those of the long distance from 20 kilometers upward. The athlete must walk, not run, and along the course there are judges who check that the participants' feet adhere to the ground correctly, with uninterrupted contact with the soil. Failure to respect this rule results in disqualification, as has happened to several athletes. In 1908, the race walk was a race for men only and remained so for the following eighty-four years. In 1932, the 50-kilometer race walk became an Olympic specialty and in 1956, the men's 20-kilometer did as well. Famous winners have included Ken Matthews in the 20 kilometers in 1960 and Don Thompson in 1964 in the 50 kilometers. The London itinerary begins and ends on the Mall, north of St. James's Park.
High Jump (Salto in alto) – The high jump consists of springing upward to clear a height indicated by a crossbar supported horizontally by two graduated uprights, placed so that it falls easily if bumped. To face it, different styles have been adopted over the years. Previously, the "scissors" jump was used, now almost entirely abandoned, then the rotation style spread with different variations. The technique then continued to evolve, along with technology. The shoes used today have a very high sole with holes in the heel, into which spikes are inserted to help the athlete at the moment of the push. The style most adopted today is the belly or back clearance, adopted by great champions with personal adjustments.
Long Jump (Salto in lungo) – In the long jump, speed, strength, and agility are combined in an attempt to land as far as possible from the point of "take-off." This specialty was already present at the 1896 Olympics, where it was part of the pentathlon. It is an exercise that has always been part of military training, given that soldiers had to be able to jump over ravines, gorges, and watercourses. In the past, athletes who practiced this discipline held weights in their hands, even of several kilograms. At the moment of the jump, they threw them forward to shift the center of gravity and increase momentum. Until 1928, the long jump was a male-only specialty. In 1935, Jesse Owens set the record of 8.13 meters, which remained unbeaten until 1960. In 1992, in Sestriere, Mike Powell set the record of 8.96 meters, which however was not validated because the wind was too strong. But even without this record, Powell is the athlete who dominated this specialty for many years, from the silver medal in Seoul in 1988 to the gold in Stuttgart in 1993. In 1991 in Tokyo, he had won gold with a world record of 8.95 meters. In Sestriere, there was also Ivan Pedroso, the Cuban athlete who in 1990, at only 17 years old, had made a jump of more than eight meters and who, in the small mountain town, had performed a jump of 8.96 meters, which however was not validated because a judge had stood in front of an anemometer and had disturbed the wind measurement. Pedroso then won the Olympic gold in 2000 in Sydney. Since 1988, the Russian Galina Chistyakova has been the holder of the world record of 7.53 m. set in Leningrad.
Triple Jump (Salto triplo) – The triple jump is based on the synchronous rhythm of movements, as well as on the timing of the strike. On the first jump, the competitor must land on the same foot with which they took off, on the second jump on the opposite foot, and on the third on both. The triple jump has its origins in ancient Greece and a variant of it was already present at the games of 1896. Brazil is one of the countries with the best jumpers. There is been Nelson Prudencio, who won a silver medal in Mexico City in 1968, and before him, Adhemar Ferreira da Silva, who won a gold medal in 1952 and 1956. In 1976 and 1980 there was Joao Carlos de Oliveira and in 2007 Jadel Gregorio, who jumped 17.90 meters in Belem.
Pole Vault (Salto con l'asta) – Before becoming a sport, the pole vault was a necessity. Those who lived in marshy areas or areas rich in watercourses, which they had to cross without getting wet, used a pole to jump over them. It was in Germany that this activity began to become a sport. In the beginning, ash poles were used for jumping, then they moved on to bamboo canes, and finally to aluminum bars, which were light and resistant. Only in modern times, with the improvement of technology, was the use of fiberglass and resin poles introduced, around a thin mandrel rod. This has produced enormous progress. In the past, participants landed on sand; now they land on an enormous bag of foam pieces. In 1896, it was the American William Hoyt who won the race with a jump of 3.3 meters. From then, and for sixteen consecutive years, the specialty was dominated by the Americans. In 2004, Tim Mack won the gold medal reaching a height of 5.95 meters. The jumpers who have done better, meaning those who have made jumps of six meters and more, are members of the "Six Club." The first to establish this record was the Ukrainian Sergei Bubka in 1985. With his thirty-five world records, he is considered one of the greatest athletes of all time. The record to beat in London belongs to Steve Hooker, with 5.96 m. The woman who has jumped highest is the Russian Yelena Isinbaeva, winner of two gold medals at the 2004 and 2008 Olympics and author of a jump of 5.06 meters in Zurich in 2009.
Discus throwing (Lancio del disco) – The statue of the Greek Discobolus, sculpted in the 5th century BC, testifies that the discus is a very ancient sport, included in the five events of the classic pentathlon. Its figure is perhaps one of the most reproduced on stamps and in images. The discus for the men's competition weighs two kilos and has a diameter of 220 millimeters; the one for women weighs half as much, one kilo. This difference in weight is partly the reason why women exceed men in the length of the throw. In 1988, the German Gabriele Reinsch made a throw of 76.80 meters. For men, the length went from 47.58 in 1912 to 74.08 in '86, a record still current today, established by Jurgen Schult. The men's Olympic record to beat in London is that of Virgilijus Alekna with 69.89 meters. The women's belongs to Martina Hellman with 72.30 meters. Originally, the discus was made of stone or iron and was lenticular, with a slight bulge on each side. Later it was manufactured from wood, plastic, or fiberglass, studded with plates that ensured the exact weight. The circular motion of the throw is a technique designed by the Italian discus thrower Oberweger, which was later adopted throughout the world. The way the equipment is gripped is important: with fingers spread so as to touch the discus only with the thumb and the last phalanx of the fingers. The throw is made from a platform two and a half meters in diameter.
Javelin (Tiro del giavellotto) – The javelin throw is part of the men's decathlon and the women's heptathlon, and its history is closely linked to military history. In the time of the Greeks and Romans, the javelin was a weapon of offense. Today, for sports practice, a pole of two and a half meters is used which, until not long ago, had a leather strap wrapped around the center of the spear at the grip point. This sport has a strong tradition in Northern European countries. Sweden, Finland, and especially Norway have won many medals in this specialty, along with Russia and Czechoslovakia.
Shot put (Getto del peso) – The competition consists of throwing a lead-filled iron ball weighing 7.257 kilograms. The one for women has a lower weight of 4 kilograms. The shot must be gripped in such a way that the arm, from the elbow to the fingers, forms a single piece. Therefore, the wrist must be bent back so that the weight of the sphere is in line of gravity with the point of the elbow and does not rest on the center of the hand, but on the base of the thumb. The former Soviet Union and the Eastern Bloc countries have been the dominators in this sport.
Throwing the hammer (Lancio del martello) – The hammer is a metal sphere weighing 7.257 kilograms, attached to a steel wire with a length of 1.22 meters. At the other end, the wire is equipped with one or two triangular handles, gripped by the athlete. The thrower, leaning within the circle of the platform, first performs some oscillations, which are essential for gaining momentum. Then they perform three or four rotations on themselves, necessary to impart a centrifugal force to their body and the hammer, allowing the equipment to reach the maximum possible distance. The men's hammer throw was already present at the Olympics from 1900. The women's has been since the year 2000. The current world record of 86.74 meters belongs to the Soviet Yuriy Sedykh, who achieved it in Stuttgart in 1986. Until 2010, the women's record belonged to Anita Wlodarczyk and had been achieved in Bydgoszcz, Poland, with a length of 78.30 meters. Since 2011, the record belongs to the German Betty Heidler, with 79.42 meters.
Pentathlon – The word, of Greek origin, is composed of two parts meaning five and struggle. It indicates, in fact, a set of five races practiced in Greece since antiquity. These races constituted the primary physical-sporting preparation of the time: running, jumping, javelin throwing, discus throwing, and wrestling. The Romans called it quinquertium. The pentathlon became part of the Olympic games in 708 BC, and the first winner was the Spartan Lampis. In years closer to our own, in 1774, the German pedagogue J. B. Basedow re-proposed it, suggesting exercises in running, jumping, climbing, balance, and weightlifting. But the country that successfully re-proposed the modern pentathlon is Sweden. The athletes of this country have always excelled in this multi-sport competition, challenged only, in the post-war period, by those from Eastern Europe. Today's five races of the men's pentathlon include: long jump, javelin throw, 200 m flat race, discus throw, and 1500 m flat race. The regulations provide for all races to take place in a single day. The women's races include shot put, high jump, 200 m flat race, hurdles, and long jump. The events are divided into two days. The table on which both the score and the ranking are drawn up is commonly called the Finnish table.
Decathlon – This track and field specialty consists of a complex of ten events, which take place over two consecutive days in a specific order. On the first day, the 100 m flat race, long jump, shot put, high jump, and 400 m flat race are held. On the second day, the 110 m hurdles, discus throw, pole vault, javelin throw, and 1500 m flat race take place. The scoring table has undergone many changes over the years, and today the ranking is not made based on placement in individual races, but based on the results obtained by each individual participant. Times taken, jump measurements, and throw distances are calculated, and a special international table is prepared for each result. The assigned score and the sum of the points obtained determine the ranking order of each competitor.
The decathlon is a specialty of Scandinavian origin. In fact, its appearance in the Olympic program dates back to the Stockholm Olympics of 1912.
HEAVY ATHLETICS (ATLETICA PESANTE)
Under the broad designation of heavy athletics are included two branches of sporting disciplines: wrestling and weightlifting. Both sectors are subdivided into various application specialties and category distinctions.
Wrestling (Lotta) – The English word wrestling is very ancient and the type of combat it indicates is even older. It is depicted in prehistoric graffiti, in Egyptian and Babylonian bas-reliefs, it is mentioned in the Iliad, it is present in Greek mythology, and it has a long tradition in China as well. The oldest figurative document of wrestling is the one found among the ruins of a temple near Baghdad. These are two tablets depicting two locked wrestlers and, next to them, two pots. In Egypt, figurines have been found reproducing wrestling scenes with various types of grips and falls. Wrestling was introduced into the games of the XVIII Olympiad, in 708 BC, when Eurybatus of Sparta was crowned champion. About fifty years later, in 648 BC, pancratium was also introduced, which combined the strikes of wrestling with those of boxing. The most famous wrestler of antiquity was Milo of Croton. In the Middle Ages and beyond, in Europe, wrestling was also practiced by nobles and kings. Among them, Francis I and Henry VIII of England.
Toward the end of the 1800s, in Paris, wrestling had even become a spectacle. At the Folies Bergère, as in other theaters, there were professionals and champions of great value who performed together. The most famous were the Frenchman Paul Pons and the Italian Giovanni Raicevich. In 1896, freestyle wrestling entered the official Olympic program and, starting from the Saint Louis games of 1904 and those in London in 1908, it became a permanent fixture. The rules of freestyle wrestling are the same as Greco-Roman wrestling and the categories are also equal: eight, as in boxing, according to the weight of the athletes. In the latter, the combat takes place over a distance of twelve minutes. Whoever is pinned and touches the floor with both shoulders loses. Unlike freestyle wrestling, here holds below the hips are not allowed, nor are "scissors" holds made with the legs. In the United States, a sport is practiced that is a derivation of wrestling. It is "catch," a bit brutal, given that almost all strikes with hands and feet are allowed. Some techniques like the clinch, hand-to-hand combat, and ground immobilization are in common with wrestling, but catch is more spectacular. Today, the traditional American "catch holding" technique is the most used. At the Athens Olympics, women participated for the first time; Japan was awarded two gold medals, one silver, and one bronze.
Judo – It is a type of Japanese wrestling that traces back to jujitsu. In 1882, Professor Jigoro Kano modified and codified traditional Japanese wrestling with sporting criteria and gave it the name of judo, which means "the way of gentleness" (or flexibility). It became a very widespread sporting and competitive activity in Japan. In 1889, judo made its appearance in Great Britain and France, but it was only after World War II that it achieved greater diffusion. In 1948, the first European federation was born in London, followed later by an international one, and in 1964, at the Tokyo Olympics, judo entered the Olympic program. In Italy, it was the work of a military naval officer, Carlo Oletti, who lived for a long time in the Far East, who ensured the diffusion of this sport in the country. The fundamental principle of judo technique is that of exploiting the laws of balance and the vulnerability of the vital points of the body. Numerous actions are possible, distinguished into assault strikes and immobilization grips. It is one sport that enables the weak to oppose the strong, which is why it is used as personal defense. Practitioners are divided into Dan and Kyu. Athletes are divided into categories, and bouts have a duration of five minutes in a single round, which is interrupted when one of the competitors has achieved a point either by throwing the opponent to the ground or immobilizing them for 30 seconds. At the Athens Olympics, it represented the third most universal sport, with athletes from ninety countries.
Weightlifting (Sollevamento pesi) – Man has developed the art of lifting weights with method and efficiency as the necessities of life imposed the education of physical strength to improve and enhance it. Today, the lifting of special heavy equipment, which at the beginning of the exercise is resting on the ground, has become a sporting practice of heavy athletics. The movement can be performed as a "snatch" (strappo) or a "clean and jerk" (slancio). The snatch is performed in a single movement, bringing the weight from the ground to the top of the arm, which is stretched vertically above the head. In the clean and jerk movement, however, the bar is lifted without stopping to shoulder height, where the weight rests on the chest or on the fully flexed arms for two seconds; then, with a jerk, the athlete lifts the bar vertically until the arms are completely extended, without producing the slightest tremor. The equipment must be held in this position, in perfect immobility, for at least two seconds.
Weightlifters are divided into seven categories: bantamweight (up to 56 kg); featherweight (up to 60 kg); lightweight (up to 67.500 kg); middleweight (up to 75 kg); light-heavyweight (up to 82.500 kg); middle-heavyweight (up to 90 kg); heavyweight (over 90 kg). The most commonly used equipment are: the dumbbell, formed by two cast iron spheres joined by a grip; the spring dumbbell, consisting of two iron parts separated by a space of 30 centimeters on which two or more springs are inserted; the iron ball; the box, which can be made of iron, cement, or stone, in the shape of a parallelepiped, provided with two grips; the barbell, consisting of a steel bar, at the ends of which iron discs are slipped.
Olympic weightlifting competitions are contested with this barbell. The bar must measure 2.14 meters and weigh 20 kilograms. The weight of individual discs is also regulated, as is the progression between one attempt and another. The sectional diameter measurements of the central part of the grip and those of the ends are also fixed by regulations. Between the ends and the central part of the bar, "collars" (fermi) are interposed, intended to hold the discs that are slipped onto the bar to graduate its weight. The discs must not have a diameter greater than 45 centimeters, so that the loaded bar is always at a minimum height of 21 centimeters from the ground. In 2000, women's weightlifting was added to the Olympic program.
Beach Volley – Beach volley began as a recreational activity, then evolved and became a professional sport. It is very similar to volleyball and, since it is played on sand, it is also called Sand Volley. The two teams of players are each made up of two people, who cannot be substituted. The sandy court is divided by a net and the goal of the game is to send the ball over the net and make it fall in the opponent's court, preventing the other team from doing the same. The ball is covered with a waterproof material and is inflated to a lower pressure than that of volleyball, even if its weight is the same. During the Second World War, American soldiers practiced this game on the beaches of Normandy and Brittany. But its origin as a true sport occurred in 1930 in California. From there it spread throughout Europe, even in countries where there is no sea. As the tournaments multiplied, the characteristics of the game and the scoring rules were definitively established.
Beach volley was present as a demonstration sport at the Barcelona Olympics in 1992. In the following years, world qualifying tournaments were organized, and in 1996, in Atlanta, the first official edition of the Olympic tournament was held. In 2000, in Australia, beach volley became one of the major attractions. At the Athens Olympics in 2004, twenty-four men's pairs and as many women's pairs participated. The tournament was held in a facility built in the style of a Greek amphitheater. The latest editions have seen the supremacy of the United States and Brazil in both men's and women's tournaments, and in 2008, in Beijing, Chinese athletes took second and third place.
Football (Calcio) – Much time has passed since a game practiced in Brittany involved two teams resorting to any means to compete for a rudimentary ball! It is impossible to determine the place where the ball game originated. Certainly, it has a very ancient history, given that Homer, in books VI and VIII of the Odyssey, recalls it among the main amusements of the Phaeacians. The physician Galen praised its hygienic value. There are many literary and figurative testimonies of the ball game among the Romans. It was practiced at the baths, before bathing, and in gyms, where specific enclosed rooms called sphaeristeria existed. The ball, made of leather, was filled with feathers or inflated with air. The two teams competed for the ball with hands and feet and tried to pass it into the opponent's half of the field. The modern game of football, however, is of English origin and dates back to the mid-nineteenth century. On October 26, 1863, during a meeting at the Free Masons Tavern in London, eleven representatives of sports clubs began to establish its characteristics and rules.
In 1871, the first FA Cup (Coppa d'Inghilterra) took place, and in 1885 professionalism was recognized. Since then, the game of football has spread across Europe and other parts of the world, and many football federations have been founded in Holland, Germany, Hungary, but also in Argentina and Uruguay, up until the creation of FIFA, the International Federation. In 1930, the first World Cup was held in Uruguay, which subsequently took place regularly every four years. In 1934, the Cup was held in Italy, with the victory of the host country, and four years later, in France. In 1954, after the interruption of the war, it was held in Switzerland, then in Sweden, Chile, and England. Football became part of the Olympic Games in 1908, at the London Olympics. Since then, except for 1932, it has always been present. Since 1996, women's football has also been present. Over the years, international competitions have increased, with the addition of the International Cup, the European Cup, the Mediterranean Games, and the Champions Cup. The great interest in these tournaments is also explained by the expansion of professional organization. The large clubs that have formed have increasingly complex economic interests and an internal organization similar to that of an industrial body, with a small army of managers, coaches, technicians, and experts, and with a large movement of capital for players signed from abroad, the formation of youth teams, medical assistance, etc.
In 1898, the Italian Football Federation was born, which organized an Italian championship with the participation of four teams and the victory of Genoa. In 1905, the federation affiliated with FIFA and began international activity. In 1934 and 1938, the players in the blue jerseys (maglia azzurra) won the world title twice. At the 1908 London Olympics, all players had to—or should have been—amateurs, according to the Olympic spirit, but this was a problem. That year, the gold medal was won by the United Kingdom. Then, over the years, there have there have also been difficult moments. In 1920, in Antwerp, Czechoslovakia abandoned the final at the 43rd minute in protest against the refereeing, which was too favorable to the Belgian team. In 1936, in Berlin, however, Peru's victory was annulled due to a pitch invasion and it was awarded by default to Austria. Austria then played against Italy, losing 2-1.
Starting from the XXIII Olympiad, it was decided to also admit young professionals, and since 1996 the teams have been composed of young players under 23 years of age. Since then, Nigeria, Cameroon, and Argentina (twice) have won. The stadiums are sometimes far from the host city. This was the case in Los Angeles, and it is so in London. In addition to Wembley Stadium, which is located in London, matches will be played at the Coventry stadium, Hampden Park in Glasgow, the Millennium Stadium in Cardiff, Old Trafford in Manchester, and St. James' Park in Newcastle.
Rowing (Canottaggio) – The depictions on vases of rowers and coxswains testify that the practice of this sporting activity already occurred in classical Latin and Greek antiquity. In 1300, the rowing boat races held in Venice were established by a decree of the Doge. The competitions aroused great interest and the term regata—or regatta—became international. In 1715, the Irish actor Thomas Doggett announced a race on the Thames for young watermen. It took place on the stretch of river between London Bridge and Chelsea. The prizes at stake for the winner were an orange-colored livery, a silver medal, and 10 gold pounds. Rowing became a sporting discipline in the 1800s. It was practiced on rivers and lakes with slender and fast boats, with a variable number of crew members, which could also include the coxswain (from this comes the phrase, in slang, "with" and "without").
The oldest English rowing club is the 'Leander Club', founded in 1817. In 1829, the first annual challenge between Oxford and Cambridge took place. In the following years, rowing spread rapidly in Europe and the United States. In 1892, FISA (Fédération Internationale des Sociétés d'Aviron) was founded in Turin, with many countries as members. Today there is the FIC, the Italian Rowing Federation. Since 1900, rowing has become an Olympic discipline. The number of crew members varies, as do the distances, which can be 200, 500, and 1000 meters. The types of competition range from endurance races to time trials.
Slalom – Inuit canoes were made from pieces of wood carried by the current and with whalebone. They had a lining of sea lion skin, sprinkled with fat to make it waterproof. In the 19th century, the British traveler and lawyer John MacGregor went to their lands to study that type of craft. Returning home, he built one for himself and with it he sailed many European rivers. Back in England, he founded the Royal Canoe Club, which in 1866 began to organize regattas. Slalom became part of the Olympic sports in 1972 and since 2008 it has been called canoe slalom or whitewater slalom—racing in white water. It is what we call rafting. Along the course there are hanging gates, poles in the middle of which one must pass. Since 1996, the races have taken place on artificial watercourses. At the beginning of the 1900s, the boats were made of fiberglass and weighed about thirty kilos. Later, Kevlar was used, which is much lighter. Furthermore, a new design allowed them to be made smaller and shorter. Starting from 1981, the three Abbagnale brothers dominated world rowing for more than a decade. Giuseppe and Carmine Abbagnale won two Olympic titles and seven world titles, while the third brother, Agostino, won two golds Olympic [titles] and two world titles. In 1988 in Seoul, they defeated the English crew composed of Stephen Redgrave and Andy Holmes and won the gold.
Sprint – The sprint was present at the Olympics since 1924 as a demonstration event. Since 1936, it became one of the competitive sports, in which women also began to participate in 1948. The canoe for the sprint is a flat boat that goes fast on a calm surface but becomes rather unstable in the presence of wind or waves. The course is divided by lines; the distances are 200 m, 500 m, and 1000 m. The specialty of the marathon, which takes place over a distance of 20 kilometers for men and 15 kilometers for women, is not present at the Olympics.
Cycling (Ciclismo) – The bicycle has spread to all Western and Eastern countries as a means of transport. Even today, it represents the fastest means of travel, especially in city traffic. In more technologically advanced countries, the bike has become a very sophisticated vehicle, made of lightweight materials, equipped with gears and thin tires. Bicycle races began in the second half of the 1800s, and today they take place mainly in Europe. The countries with the longest tradition in this sense are France, Spain, Belgium, and Italy. The most famous races are the Liège-Bastogne-Liège, started in 1892; the Paris-Roubaix, started in 1896; and the Milan-San Remo, from 1905. All three take place within a day. Among the best-known stage races are the Tour de France, started in 1903, and the Giro d'Italia, started in 1909. Cycling competitions have been present at the Olympics since 1896 in Athens.
Equestrian (Equestrian Dressage, Eventing, Jumping) – The art of training and riding a horse is very ancient. Asian peoples were the first to domesticate this animal. Later, through the Egyptians, Assyrians, and Greeks, the art spread throughout the Mediterranean and also to Rome. Xenophon's work On Horsemanship, written around 400 BC, is the classic treatise on equestrianism of the ancient world. In ancient armies, the cavalry was an important weapon, which had developed increasingly refined tactics. At that time, however, a rudimentary bit and a simple rug on the horse's back were used, which did not allow the rider to hold on firmly. It was during the reign of Charlemagne that the use of the saddle spread, to which stirrups were attached. The inventors of the latter were probably the Chinese. During the Middle Ages, heavy armor and the type of combat—in battle as in tournaments—required strong and muscular horses. Later, the advent of firearms greatly reduced the importance of cavalry in war.
In the 16th century, the first riding schools were born in Italy and France, and the maneuvering skills and dexterity of riders were displayed in tournaments. In 1539, Cesare Fiaschi founded the first riding school in Naples. Later, Giovan Battista Pignatelli invented the maneggio (riding arena), a prepared track for horse exercises, both individual and collective. The most important characteristic of the arena was having soft and resistant ground, formed by a layer of sawdust over a gravel sub-base. Sometimes the track was enclosed in a large warehouse, with walls covered in sloping wooden boards, above which there were windows and galleries for the public. In Pignatelli's school, there were French and English students, some of whom belonged to the aristocracy. These students then brought new training methods back to their countries and in turn founded schools. In Padua and Mantua, there were also schools of great prestige. One of the most important at a European level was the school in Vienna, established in 1729 by Emperor Charles VI. Federico Caprilli, cavalry officer at Tor di Quinto and in Pinerolo, at the beginning of the twentieth century, revolutionized horse riding technique after having carefully studied the animal's nature, its reactions to guidance that did not favor its natural tendencies, and instead forced it into artificial and non-spontaneous movements. The officer's method, however, provided that the horse be supported in its movements and that the rider's position in the saddle should be leaning forward, to weigh with the weight on the hocks and not on the horse's kidneys. It also provided for a very rare use of the bit, to gently accustom the horse to surrender to the light pressure of the reins. The Caprilli method had so many merits that it spread everywhere. Among the various specialties today there are horse shows, Olympic events, and outdoor events. Horse shows are aimed at highlighting the various qualities of the horses and their degree of training. They are divided into categories, according to the qualities they intend to reward. The ranking is drawn up with the penalty system for points, based on the number of obstacles knocked down and the time taken to complete the course.
The Olympic events are three and for each an individual ranking and a team ranking are provided.
Dressage involves the exhibition of the horse in a series of previously communicated movements. The complete equestrian competition, eventing, is divided into three tests to be held over three days: dressage, the cross-country over a total distance of 33.500 km, and the jumping event.
Rhythmic, Artistic, and Trampoline Gymnastics (Gymnastics) – The term gymnastics indicates a complex of exercises and sporting games with different characteristics. In Greece, the name was used specifically for the five events of the pentathlon: the foot race, the long jump, the discus throw, the javelin throw, and wrestling. Today the word gymnastics indicates both basic physical training and the set of floor exercises and equipment exercises carried out according to official regulations and measured based on precise evaluation criteria. Gymnastics was very widespread in the Greek world, but when it passed to Rome and elsewhere, it lost many of its peculiar characteristics. It had alternating fortunes in various historical periods. In the Middle Ages physical exercises were not very in vogue; they were reborn in the Renaissance era. In the Ca' Zoiosa of Vittorino da Feltre in Mantua there was one of the first examples of concrete application of the new ideas. But it was only in the 19th century that there was a great development of gymnastics. Most of the sports practiced today, individual and team, had their first start in gymnastics societies, which became multi-sport clubs. In 1896 at the modern Athens Olympics, gymnastics was among the most popular specialties and already grouped many of the exercises still performed today. Among the most important specialties of gymnastics in the program in London are floor exercise, vault, pommel horse, rings, parallel bars, and horizontal bar. In the trampoline specialty, two medals are awarded in the men's and women's individual competitions.
Field Hockey (Hockey su prato) – Hockey includes three different games, differing in the terrain on which they are practiced. There is field hockey, rink hockey, and ice hockey. Field hockey is the oldest, given that one of its variants was already practiced by the Persians. It then passed to the Greeks and finally to the Romans. In a 5th-century bas-relief discovered in Athens, young men engaged in a game with a ball and curved sticks are sculpted. Also in Asia and South America there are testimonies of a ball sport practiced both on foot and on horseback, with the use of a stick. In Europe, it was first practiced in Great Britain, then in India and Pakistan occupied by the British. Here it became so popular as to become the national sport. The two countries have reached positions of supremacy in world competitions.
In 1873, the players of the Trinity Hockey Club and the Wimbledon Hockey Club used a rope ball and ash sticks. In those years, a code of rules was also established and the first international matches began. At the 1908 Olympics, field hockey became part of the official program of the games. The teams were made up of 11 players, the matches took place in two halves of 35 minutes each, the ball was made of cork or rubber and the goals had standard measurements. In Italy, field hockey has never been widely practiced and, in any case, it has been more at an amateur level.
Hockey su pista (Roller Hockey) – Centre. The game was born in England, from where it then passed to France, where the first European championships were held. It then spread to Germany, gradually gaining a place in Italy as well. In 1912, the first club was born in Milan, the Skating Savini. Hockey is played on polished rinks, generally made of cement, and the players of the two teams are equipped with roller skates. The duration of the matches is 60 minutes, divided into two halves.
Hockey su ghiaccio (Ice Hockey) – Two Canadian cities, Halifax and Montreal, contend for the boast of having given origin to ice hockey. On March 13, 1875, the first match was played between them. Before then, ice hockey was a sport played by the military. When it then spread to the United States, it took on great importance and gave rise to professionalism. American supremacy was then contested by Russia and Sweden. In Italy, ice hockey was played for the first time in 1911 in Turin, where the "Società dei pattinatori del Valentino" held an international match against a team from Lyon. Then there was the construction in Milan of the "Palazzo del Ghiaccio", in 1924 and since then the sport has begun to spread. Since 1946 the Federation has been associated with the figure and speed skating club.
The game of ice hockey consists of sending a puck into the opponent's net by hitting it with a stick. The team is made up of 15 players equipped with ice skates, but only six are on the field at the same time. The others stay ready for substitutions, which can take place at any time. The match lasts three periods of twenty minutes each.
Nuoto (Swimming Marathon) - Nuoto sincronizzato (Syncronized Swimming) - Olympic Park, Aquatics Centre. The art of swimming is very ancient. Since prehistoric times man has had to face the problem of how to cross waterways, how to move and stay afloat in that environment so different from his natural one, an environment that involved, among other things, a different coordination of movements. Little by little he perfected his gestures and tuned them to the different needs of the new element. Swimming requires a close relationship between muscle dynamics and respiratory mechanics, it needs great coordination, a perfect response between the movements of the muscles and the respiratory function. It is one of the most complete physical activities, which requires a harmonic action of the entire muscular system, without disjointed efforts. The oldest depiction of a man in the act of swimming is in an Assyrian bas-relief from 1000 BC, preserved at the British Museum in London. Three warriors are seen fleeing across a river, under the threat of enemy archers. Two of them blow air into skins, used as floats, a third instead swims with legs extended, arms rotating and head raised.
Among the Romans the practice of swimming was included in physical-military training. Young people even trained to cross waterways while wearing weapons and armor. Even the natives of Polynesia practiced it since ancient times. Christopher Columbus wrote in his diary that a multitude of people were swimming around the recently arrived caravels. In Asia, swimming was practiced with different styles. In India, people swam on one side, with only one arm rotating out of the water. English officials then brought this style to Europe, which today is used, for example, by lifeguards for rescues. We recall an extraordinary episode: in 1817, the Piedmontese soldier of the Napoleonic army Giovanni Maria Salati, a prisoner of the English, threw himself into the sea from a barge near Dover, swimming across the English Channel and reaching the Breton coast in less than twenty-four hours. Over the centuries, different swimming styles have developed, present for a long time at the Olympics: breaststroke, backstroke, and butterfly. Starting from the 1908 Melbourne Games, the butterfly stroke has also been present, which is almost an artistic swim. ... Synchronized swimming, which includes dance and gymnastics movements, has been present at the Olympics since 1984 in Los Angeles. It is reserved for women.
Pallacanestro (Basketball) – Basketball was devised in 1891 by James Naismith, a Canadian Lutheran pastor and physical education teacher at the University of Kansas. His goal was to keep students busy during the winter period, when they had to stay indoors. In December of that year, the school newspaper published the rules of the new game, whose name referred to its two essential elements: the ball and the basket. Some of the rules from back then have changed, but the fundamental postulates—which make it, among other things, a sport free of violence, since even simple contacts are prevented—were already present in those thirteen points of 1891. Six years later, the first championship was held in the United States, from where the game spread to Europe. The first notable Italian match was in 1919 and took place in the park of the Royal Villa of Monza. In the same year, an Italian team placed second, behind the United States, at the Joinville Games. In 1920, the Costanza team of Milan won the Italian championship. Always in that year, the name Federazione Italiana Basket-Ball was changed to Federazione Italiana Palla al Cesto. Basketball has given rise to famous European teams, such as the Celtics, active between 1915 and 1928. The American Harlem Globetrotters are still applauded today for their tightrope-walking skills and acrobatic shots.
Pallamano (Handball) – It is a sport that has existed since antiquity, but in its more modern version, it has been practiced since the beginning of the 1900s. As in the game of soccer, one must try to score a goal in the opponent's net. It was at the 1936 Berlin Games that the sport was included for the first time in the Olympics. Two teams of seven players each face off. Among them is the goalkeeper, there are the full-backs, the right wing, and the left wing. It is a very widespread sport in the world and the Olympic matches will be among the most followed.
Pallanuoto (Water Polo) – Current water polo has changed several names over the course of its history. It is a team sport that requires excellent swimming skills and great resistance to physical effort. Players can never touch the bottom, under penalty of disqualification. The first reliable news of water polo dates back to 1870, when a commission appointed in London studied a regulation for a new game that was establishing itself, in a chaotic way, for a few decades. In 1888, the English clubs in which it was practiced gathered in the London Water-polo League, unifying the rules. Since then, the game has spread to Europe through Germany. In 1897, the International Board Water Polo laid the foundations for a new regulation with the drafting of a single code for the whole world. The dimensions of the playing field, those of the goals, the depth of the water, the number of players, the mandatory nature of the caps with the number printed on top were established. The series of passes made by the players to reach the goal opponent's goal where the ball must enter is similar to that of soccer, and the goalkeeper is the only one authorized to touch the bottom with their feet.
Water polo became part of the Olympic program at the beginning of the 1900s in Paris, where it was one of the first team sports. In Italy, it made its appearance in 1909. In 1912, the first national championship was held, with the victory of the Genoa Club over Rari Nantes Partenope. In 1928, the Hungarian coach Bela Komjadi invented the aerial pass — previously, the ball was allowed to fall into the water and then reached — and in 1936, the Californian coach Jimmy Smith designed a new ball. In 1948 in London, the Italian team won the gold medal. In 1952 in Helsinki, they won the bronze. In 1960 in Rome, they won gold again, and in 1976 in Montreal, the silver. In 1992 in Barcelona, they won the gold medal and in 1996, in Atlanta, the bronze. Women were admitted for the first time to the Sydney Olympics, after protests by the Australian women's team.
Pallavolo (Volleyball) – Earls Court. On February 9, 1895, in Holyoke, Massachusetts, William Morgan, a physical education teacher, created an indoor game which he called mintonette. It was intended to be a less demanding alternative to basketball. Seeing the players on the court today, with their fast, energetic actions, one doesn't get the idea that it is exactly a "quiet" game. Originally, the two teams were formed by a variable number of players. A match consisted of nine innings with three serves for each. Subsequently, the game also spread outside the United States and the number of members of each team stabilized at six. In 1924, in Paris, there was the first participation of volleyball in an Olympiad, as a demonstration sporting event. Only in 1964 was it fully admitted. In Beijing, in 2008, the gold medals were won by the United States for the men's team and by Brazil for the women's team. In London, the eight teams that pass the finals will fight for the gold.
Pugilato (Boxing) – Some Sumerian statuettes depicting boxers with their hands clad in a basket tell us that boxing is a very ancient sport, also present in Greek mythology with Hercules. In 688 BC, it became part of the Olympics and the first champion was Onomastos of Smyrna. The last was the Armenian Varazdat, who later also became king. In Rome, boxing was practiced with bare fists or protected by leather strips garnished with studs. Emperor Caligula was a passionate practitioner. In years closer to us, boxing was practiced mainly in England and the United States. In 1867, rules were introduced, including those regarding the duration of the rounds, their number, and the obligation to use gloves (Marquess of Queensberry????).
In 1900, categories were also introduced: flyweight, featherweight, lightweight, light-welterweight, welterweight, light-middleweight, middleweight, light-heavyweight, heavyweight. In the English language, there is a jargon to indicate the punches: the diretto is called straight, the gancio is called hook, the montante is called uppercut, the sinistro is called jab and the destro right.
Rugby – The name is that of the English town of Rugby, in the county of Warwick, where a stone tablet commemorates the birth of this sport in 1823. From here the game then spread not only in Europe, but also in South Africa and Australia. In Italy, rugby began to spread in 1910. Twenty years later, the Federazione della Palla Ovale (Oval Ball Federation) was founded, a name that derives from the shape of the ball used in this sport. Rugby, especially in the United States, has always been essentially a university sport, and at an international level, it has never even remotely rivaled soccer.
The teams are composed of fifteen players, who must try to bring the ball into the try area. To do this, players can use their hands and feet and can bring down the opponent who has the ball with a 'tackle' to the legs, or grab them by the neck or waist. In the event of an involuntary error, such as passing the ball forward with the hands, a scrum is performed, in which the 'forwards' of the two teams compete for the ball with their feet while bending forward. The match lasts 80 minutes, 40 for each of the two halves.
Scherma (Fencing) – ExCeL. Fencing, as the art of defending oneself and attacking with a weapon having certain characteristics, has very ancient origins, but it is only from the end of the 1800s that it can be traced as a sport as we know it today. In ancient Rome, there were schools where this art was taught with wooden swords. In the Middle Ages, justice was often entrusted to the outcome of a duel with bladed weapons. Later, with the rise of chivalry and the establishment of a certain sense of honor, the science of arms was consolidated. In 1531, the Bolognese master of arms Achille Marozzo wrote a fundamental treatise on fencing, with technical rules. In the 1700s, the French school established itself, and in the 1800s, fencing activity became a competitive sport, which then entered the program of the first Olympics with an individual foil and sabre competition. As early as 1908, in London,
Giuseppe Mangiarotti had worn the blue uniform. His sons, Edoardo, Mario, and Dario, between 1936 and 1960, won six gold medals, five silver, and two bronze. In those years, in fact, Italy was among the nations that dominated the world scene, along with France and Hungary. Only after the 1956 Melbourne Olympics did this supremacy begin to be threatened by the progress of the USSR and Poland. The specialties and terms of fencing in English sound like this: épée (spada), foil (fioretto), sabre (sciabola), lunge (affondo), parry (parata), and riposte (risposta). While for men the permitted weapons are the foil, the épée, and the sabre, for women only the foil is allowed. Fencers wear a white jacket, a mask to protect the face, and wear a glove.
Taekwondo – In the Korean language, taekwondo indicates a discipline of kicks and punches. It is a martial art that offers great tension because its objective is to hit the opponent with kicks and punches on specific areas that count for the score. A kick or punch thrown to the torso is worth one point, a spinning kick is worth two points, and a kick to the head is worth four points. Over the white uniform, the dobok, the two contenders wear protective equipment. One is blue in color, the other is red. The match is made up of three rounds of two minutes each, and the categories are the same as in boxing. Taekwondo made its appearance at the Seoul Olympics in 1988 as a demonstration sport. It was admitted in an official capacity twelve years later, at the Sydney games.
Tennis – Tennis derives from the French medieval jeu de paume, which was played by hitting the ball with the hand. In the 16th century, people began to use the racket and to call this sport tennis, which was played indoors. The first tennis club was founded in 1872 at Leamington Spa by Harry Gem and Augurio Perera. Modern terminology began to develop in the second half of the 1800s. In 1877, at Wimbledon, the first championship was played, which gave rise to the debate on how to standardize its rules. Tennis began to be played in the United States as well, on Staten Island and in other cities, and the size of the balls and rackets used was different. In 1900, the Davis Cup began to be played, and in 1924 the International Tennis Federation promulgated rules for the whole world, which remained unchanged for decades.
Here is the word-for-word translation of the text from the image into English, maintaining the original structure and content:
In 1926, a group of French and English players played the first professional tennis in front of a paying audience. At the same time, there were tournaments for amateurs. In 1954, in Rhode Island, Van Alen founded the International Tennis Hall of Fame, which houses a collection of memorabilia of tennis players who have gone down in history. Every year there is a grass court tournament and an induction ceremony for new members. Rackets have also undergone an evolution. For a century they were built of wood, with strings made of animal gut. Then different and lighter materials were introduced, such as carbon fibers and titanium for the frame and synthetic fibers for the strings. The balls, instead, are made of rubber and are covered by a layer of felt. Tennis had made its appearance at the Olympic games of 1896. At the 1920 Olympics, the Frenchwoman Suzanne Lenglen was awarded the title. In 1988, in Seoul, another woman, the German Steffi Graf won the women's gold medal. In London, the lawns on which today's matches are played are the same ones on which the matches of 1908 were held, the year in which Great Britain won all six gold medals up for grabs. English jargon has become international and everyone by now says tie-break, to indicate what occurs when the teams are equal at the third or fifth set.
Tennis da tavolo (Table Tennis) - In the beginning it was a pastime for when the weather was bad, with improvised equipment; in 1890 the first table tennis set appeared in England with a cloth to put on the table bearing the lines of a tennis court, two small rackets, a rubber ball covered in fabric, a small net to put in the middle of the table. In this new form, the sport began to have an enormous success, becoming popular all over the world with different names, including that of ping pong. In Asia a great school was born, so important as to lead Asian athletes to often prevail throughout the world. In the East, the way of gripping the racket is different, and is called 'penhold'. The match is played over seven games and the game requires qualities of coordination, speed of movement and reflexes. Doubles matches are also played. Table tennis is a specialty in which Italian athletes have never particularly distinguished themselves at an international level. Here, some imported athletes of foreign origin play. Table tennis has been present at the Olympics since 1988, in Seoul, South Korea. With subsequent editions, its popularity has increased throughout the world. Some things have changed, such as for example the format of the game, which has become similar to that of the Davis Cup.
Tiro con l'arco (Archery) - Archery was born as a necessity. The curved wooden rod that held a string in tension from which to launch an arrow was a tool used for hunting and with it prehistoric man obtained food. In the Paleolithic the arrows were manufactured with pine wood and the tip was of flint. Unfortunately, the bow was also used in war, as a weapon of offense. In this use it was later replaced by firearms, easier to use, which did not have the need for long training or a robust musculature. The bow entered into Greek and Roman mythology, adopted by deities such as Apollo, Cupid, Diana... It was also used by William Tell [and] Robin Hood.
Archery skill competitions spread to all classical civilizations. Among some peoples they were also practiced on horseback. At the end of the 1700s, in England, archery had spread among the aristocracy and among wealthy people, thanks to its charm as a medieval weapon, present in the Gothic novel, whose events were set in a fantastic Middle Ages. Even the novels of Walter Scott contributed to the spread of archery. Clubs arose whose members practiced it in costume. Furthermore, enthusiasts or experts of archery in English are called 'toxophilite'. The term derives from Toxophilus, which is the title of a book written by Ascham in 1545. The name literally means 'lover of the bow'. Archery made its first appearance at the Paris Olympics in 1900. There was then a long interruption and it reappeared in Munich in 1972.
Shooting (Tiro a segno) - It was born as a function of military training and has archery as its forefather. Literary examples of it are found in the Odyssey, in the legends of Robin Hood and William Tell. From the mid-1500s, competitions intensified, open to all firearms, with regulations regarding the shape and size of targets and distance, varying according to the type of weapon used. With the refinement of weapons and the consequent increase in their power and precision, the sport of Shooting has become increasingly widespread. In Italy, Giuseppe Garibaldi and Vittorio Emanuele II were the ones to promote the creation of shooting competitions. Today, shooting takes place in specific enclosures called shooting ranges, equipped with embankments and safety measures to avoid accidents. In the Olympics, which are also open to women, rifles and pistols participate. In Los Angeles, in 1932, the Italians Renzo Morigi and Domenico Matteucci won the gold and bronze medals respectively with the automatic pistol.
In Montreal, in 1976, Roberto Ferraris won the bronze with the automatic pistol. In Atlanta, in 1996, Roberto Di Donna won the gold with the free pistol. Since 1984, women have also participated and in Athens, in 2004, Valentina Turisini won the silver with the sport rifle. In Beijing, there were hundreds of athletes.
Triathlon - The triathlon was born in France in the decade 1920-1930, under the name of 'les trois sports'. But the first event called by this name was held in San Diego, California, in September 1974, with about fifty participants. The triathlon is composed of three sports in sequence: swimming (which in London takes place in the Serpentine), cycling (on a loop that goes from Buckingham Palace to Wellington Arch) and running (again around the Serpentine). The standard length to cover in swimming is 1,500 meters, that to cover by bike is 40 kilometers, that to cover by running is 10 kilometers. The triathlon made its debut at the Olympics in 2000 and fifty-two men and forty-eight women participated. Drafting is allowed during the bike races and it is a sport that causes frequent disputes.
Two medals are awarded, one for men, one for women. The triathlon made its debut at the Sydney Olympics in 2000 and Italy has always participated in both the men's and women's races. But the countries that have won medals most often are Australia, New Zealand, Germany and Switzerland.
Diving (Tuffi) - The Greek fresco from 470 B.C. found in a tomb in Paestum demonstrates how ancient this practice is. It was born with a utilitarian value, then entered the sporting domain at a later stage, acquiring an athletic and acrobatic meaning. Diving is a combination of acrobatic and gymnastic movements — almost a dance — that the body performs during the fall toward the water. The pioneers were the Germans, who distinguished themselves since the European championships of 1893. The first Italian championship took place in 1902 and was won by Carlo Bonfanti. Since 1904, when the sport became part of the Olympics, it has become popular. Since 1925 there has been springboard diving (1 m and 3 m) and platform diving (5 m and 10 m) and from 2000 onwards synchronized diving was added. In springboard diving there are three essential moments: the start with or without a run-up, the flight and the entry into the water. The three classic positions are the straight dive (with the body straight and lower limbs together), the pike dive (with the body bent at right angle and legs straight), the tuck dive (with the body curled, extending to enter the water). The Italian athletes who have made the greatest contribution to this sport have been Klaus Dibiasi, Giorgio Cagnotto, his daughter Tania, and teammate Francesca Dallapé.
Sailing (Vela) - There is evidence of sailing vessels dating back six thousand years before Christ. Sailing therefore has a millennial history. As far as the sails are concerned, we have moved from the square sail, suitable for downwind legs but unsuitable for sailing upwind (it was necessary to wait for the wind to blow in the right direction), to the lateen sail, which appeared around 2000 BC in the seas of China. The latter formed a variable angle with respect to the wind direction and allowed a wider choice of route. Then came gaff sails and finally triangular, Marconi or Bermuda sails, which appeared in 1875. Today there is the spinnaker, the triangular foresail with a voluminous belly, hoisted for the first time on board a British yacht in 1865.
Over the years, a tendency has developed to employ an increasingly vast sail area and to use two- and three-masted rigging, even for relatively small hulls. As for sail material, we have moved from cotton, linen, and hemp to today's synthetic fiber fabrics, which ensure greater resistance to tearing, are light, non-deformable, and impermeable to air as well as water. Also for the hull, increasingly satisfactory construction materials have been used for resistance and impermeability. We have moved from wood to plywood, made by gluing multiple sheets, to steel, aluminum alloys, and fiberglass paste. In the 1800s, hulls had to have characteristics of great stability and capacity, given that the use of vessels was mercantile and bellicose. Then, the advent of the steam engine marked the end of the era of sailing ships. The same evolution took place regarding the rudder.
Already in the 12th century, the introduction of the fixed rudder, which replaced the two blade-oars fixed to the sides of the stern, had made boats more maneuverable. This was then replaced by a central centerboard and, subsequently, the use of the weighted external false keel. As far as pleasure boating is concerned, it was only from the mid-1800s that sailing ships intended for sporting practice began to be designed. So-called yachting can be traced back to the beginning of the 17th century, when the wealthy Dutch bourgeoisie began to use 'jaght', small and fast vessels initially used both to hunt predators and smugglers, and to go out to meet the large merchant ships returning from the Indies. Then people began to go sailing with friends and competitions began. In 1660, Charles II of England, for his restoration to the throne, received a yacht as a gift from Holland. From 그 moment, the name became of international use. The first sailing clubs were born in England, Ireland, and America. In 1879 the Reale Yacht Club Italiano was founded, which later became the Federazione Italiana Vela, an organ of CONI and the International Regatta Federation.
The first international regatta was contested in 1851 around the Isle of Wight. It was called the 100-guinea competition because that was the value of the cup at stake. Subsequently, it was called the America's Cup after the name of the schooner that marked, from then on, American supremacy. Over the years, oceanic regattas and solo crossings have followed one another. There are many national and international regulations that recognize a multiple series of classes and vessels. There are six monotype classes, four of which are fixed keel: Star, for two people, Olympic class since 1932; Dragon, for three, Olympic since 1948; Soling, for three; Tempest, for two; Finn, single-seater, Olympic since 1952; Flying Dutchman, for two, since 1960. Defending the colors of the "Azzurri" in London there will be, among others, Francesca Clapcich, from the Air Force. Windsurfing will also be part of Olympic sailing.
Badminton (Volano) – It is thought that the game of badminton was brought to England by some British officials stationed in Poona, India. Before becoming a sport, it was a recreational activity. The shuttlecock is a cork or rubber hemisphere in which feathers are planted, to be hit with a racket and launched over the net. It is played in singles or doubles and is similar to tennis, although, in badminton, the small feathered knob has aerodynamic properties all its own, which lead it to fly differently from the balls used in other sports. The knob weighs about 5 grams and contains sixteen feathers, plucked from the wings of geese. It even reaches a speed of 400 kilometers per hour, therefore requiring great quickness of reflexes to follow its trajectory!
Badminton is one of the most widespread and practiced sports in the world and is under the control of the IBF, the International Badminton Federation, to which more than one hundred and fifty nations from all continents belong. In 1992 it became an Olympic sport, with five different events. Precisely in that year, Petra Schrott from South Tyrol qualified for Italy. At the Beijing Olympics in 2008, however, Agnese Allegrini was unfortunately eliminated early.
Vices, virtues and bizarre episodes at the Olympics
Over the centuries, the Olympics have been a mirror of human vices and virtues. In the competitions, selfishness, malice, pettiness, the desire to cheat, lies, and the inability to lose have come to light, but also the spirit of sacrifice, patience, tenacity, and the resigned acceptance of an undeserved disqualification. And, speaking of disqualifications, one of the most unreasonable was that suffered by the American athlete Kelly Garrison-Steve. Like many champions in her specialty, to climb onto the asymmetric bars, Kelly used a mounting board, which was removed by one of her colleagues after she had gripped the bars. That day, after removing the equipment, her colleague remained on the podium to watch Kelly perform her exercise. A technicality, unknown to most, stipulated that only the gymnast should be on the platform. The East German athletes' group contested the violation, the jury agreed with them, and Kelly was disqualified. The protests of the Americans were of no avail.
A discipline in which disqualifications are frequent is race walking, and it even happens that they are issued without the participant's knowledge. It is difficult to check that the feet do not lose contact with the ground and that, when the left big toe leaves the ground, the right heel is already well planted, while the pelvis continues to roll. In 2000, at the Sydney Olympics, the Mexican walker Bernardo Segura was leading the race and had already received two warnings, the second of which he had not realized. When he received the third, equivalent to disqualification, he thought it was only the second and entered the stadium as a winner, crossing the finish line ahead of the Pole Robert Korzeniowski. He then did a lap of honor amid the enthusiastic applause of the Mexicans present. But, while he was receiving a congratulatory phone call from the President of his country, the disqualification was communicated to him. All hell broke loose. Mexican television and newspapers cried conspiracy, spoke of international intrigue... But there was nothing to be done; the medal went to the Pole Korzeniowski. Our walker Elisabetta Perrone, who had won the silver medal at the previous Olympics, also ran into disqualification but continued the race anyway. She seemed unwilling to accept the verdict, but after passing the Australian athlete Jane Saville, she retired. The race was then won by a Chinese woman named Wang Liping.
Some disqualifications have been the result of absurd situations. On August 6, 1992, in Barcelona, the Iranian boxer Ali Kazemi realized he had lost his gloves just a few minutes before the match. Not having found a spare pair, Kazemi had to be disqualified. The boxer from Vanuatu, Edward Paululum, a flyweight, was instead disqualified because, on the day of the match, he had eaten so much that he arrived overweight at the weigh-in. All that was left for him to do was to take the first departing plane and head back home.
At other times, however, the disqualification originated from a lack of information. At the 1972 Munich Olympics, two American students, Robinson and Hart, had been informed by their coach that the race they were to participate in would take place at 7:00 PM on August 31. While they were relaxing in front of the television in the early afternoon, they saw the race on the screen, but they were not alarmed because they thought it was a replay of the heats. When they realized it was a live broadcast and saw their names next to the words 'not available', they were shocked. They tried to reach the stadium as quickly as possible, but they did not arrive in time. The race had been brought forward and no one had warned them. The Ethiopian long-distance runner Miruts Yifter, on the other hand, was disqualified from the 5000-meter race at the same Olympics because he had been stuck in the toilet.
Often, the cause of withdrawal from the games is not a disqualification, but an accident that forces the athlete to retire. This is what happened to the Canadian windsurfer Murray McCaig. While he was cycling inside the Barcelona Olympic Village and was overtaking a bus moving very slowly, he was hit by a police car and fractured a leg. His American colleague Mike Gebhardt, on the other hand, while competing in the race at the Parc de Mar in Barcelona, whose surface was very dirty, lost positions because his board got caught in a large plastic bag. But the Olympics have seen far more serious dramas than these. In Rome, in 1960, on worldwide television, there was the death of the Danish marathon runner Knut Jensen, due to a head injury following a fall during the race. It was later discovered that Jensen had taken Ronicol, a prohibited medicine that stimulates blood circulation.
Sometimes, to be admitted, curious expedients are used. On December 7, 1956, at the Melbourne Olympics, weightlifting champion Charles Vinci was overweight compared to the limit allowed for bantamweights like him. He was sent to run for an hour to burn off the excess fat, but fifteen minutes before the race, he was still nearly two kilos over. What else could be eliminated? Someone on the staff had a flash of genius: shave his head! That was enough to bring him back within the weight limit and allow him to win the gold medal. There was another athlete who cut her hair, but to punish herself for not winning. Javelin thrower Elvira Orzolina had beautiful long curly hair. After the defeat, she went to the Olympic Village hairdresser determined to have her head shaved. Fortunately, the hairdresser, a Japanese man, managed to dissuade her and choose a cut that was a middle ground.
There have also been those who, in order to participate, did not hesitate to resort to deception. John Belisle, for example, used his dual nationality to participate in two Olympics. He was born in Honduras, raised in Belize, and then became an American citizen. Since he had no hope of making the American team at the 1988 Olympics as a marathon runner, given his modest athletic skills, he enlisted among the athletes of Belize. The race had been won by our Gelindo Bordin and he reached the finish line an hour later. Not at all discouraged, however, he tried his luck again four years later, under the flag of Honduras. Unfortunately, he was recognized during the heats and was expelled. There was also the case of the racing specialist Madeleine de Jesus, from Puerto Rico, who had cheated on her identity. After suffering an injury in a competition, she had her twin sister Margaret substitute for her at the 1984 Games.
Speaking of cheating, a very sophisticated trick was implemented at the Montreal Olympics in July 1976 by the thirty-eight-year-old major of the Red Army, Boris Onishenko, originally from Kiev. That year, the star of the Games was the Romanian gymnast Nadia Comăneci, who had captured the attention of millions of people with her grace. Onishenko was a world pentathlon champion and a great fencer but, to be absolutely sure of winning, he had modified the device that electronically signaled contact with the opponent. When the referee — the Italian Guido Malacarne — asked him to hand over his sword for routine checks at the end of the match, Onishenko pretended not to understand and headed quickly behind the group of Soviet athletes, where there was probably a spare sword. When the referee insisted, an argument broke out and the deception was discovered.
A particular type of deception, if we want to call it that, concerns the 'uncertain' sex of some female athletes. It has been discussed since the 1930s. In 1936, the Polish 100-meter athlete Stanislawa Walasiewicz had accused her American rival Helen Stephens of being a man. The paradoxical thing is that, instead, she was the one who was a man. This came out many years later in dramatic circumstances. Walaziewicz had moved to America and taken the name Stella Walsh. Unfortunately, she met her death during a shootout, and the autopsy examination then revealed her true sex.
The most famous female athletes linked to this ambiguous situation were the Soviet sisters Tamara and Irina Press. In 1960, Tamara had won the gold medal in the shot put and the discus throw. In the same year, Irina had won the 80-meter hurdles and had triumphed in the pentathlon. Between the two of them, in their career, they set 23 world records. The fact that in 1968, when 'sex tests' were introduced, they suddenly disappeared from international competitions — which they had dominated until that moment — would seem to prove those right who insinuated that they received injections of male hormones.
Confusion, not of gender but on the field of play, has led to curious results, deceiving the participants in the competitions. In Seoul, in 1988, it was decided to divide the stadium where the boxing matches were held into two sectors. In this way, it was possible to hold multiple competitions simultaneously. The traditional bell was used for matches in area A and a buzzer for matches in area B. During the match between the American Todd Foster and the Korean Chun Jin Chul, the bell rang, which was actually for the other contenders. The Korean, believing there was an interval, turned to go and sit down. At that moment, his opponent landed a punch that knocked him to the mat.
In Rome as well, the wrong interpretation of the sound of a whistle had bad consequences. During the men's hockey match between Belgium and France, a traffic policeman used his whistle just outside the stadium. The Belgians, believing it was the referee blowing for the end of time, stopped playing. The French immediately took advantage of this to score a goal, bringing the result to 1-0.
Several times, during the Games, there have been political protests by those who took advantage of the event's great resonance to bring their own grievance to the eyes of the world. This happened, for example, in Mexico City, when the two black American athletes Smith and Carlos, winners respectively of a gold and a bronze one. While the notes of the national anthem were playing, they raised a gloved, clenched fist. They were immediately expelled and stripped of their medals, but their gesture became a milestone in demonstrations in favor of human rights.
Political events should not influence the course of the games, but when they are very dramatic, it is understandable that there is no necessary detachment, as happened in Melbourne in 1956. On November 4 of that year, Soviet troops had invaded Hungary, crushing the ongoing revolution. On December 6, there was a match between the water polo teams of the two countries at the games. The Hungarians had won the three previous editions. While scoring the first goal, a Hungarian player bumped into a Soviet player. This gave rise to an escalation of blows, first hidden and on the quiet, then increasingly evident, so much so that the match was interrupted. When this happened, the water was stained with blood. The victory—and the gold medal—was awarded to Hungary, which was leading 4-0.
Alongside the negative things, however, there were also many episodes of heroism. In 1988 in Seoul, for example, the American diver of Samoan origin, Greg Louganis, who had hit his head during a dive from the three-meter springboard during the preliminaries, competed with a bandaged head, controlling the pain, and won the gold. The Japanese gymnast Shun Fujimoto also demonstrated superhuman control of pain. In the heats of the 1972 Munich Olympics, he broke his kneecap. Without saying anything to anyone so as not to worry the team, he continued to perform the exercises on the horse and rings, the dismount from which involved a painful landing that worsened the damage. However, he succeeded, although the doctors who saw him later could hardly believe he had managed to land (sin.) without screaming.
At the 1964 Tokyo Olympics, the discus thrower Don Schollander, who would later win four gold medals, arrived with an orthopedic collar. He had dislocated a cervical vertebra and everyone thought it was over. Nothing could be further from the truth, given that, on October 15, he set a new record with a discus throw of 61 m. Another episode of heroism occurred at the 1968 Mexico City Olympics. The Tanzanian marathon runner John Akhwari, originally from Arusha, arrived at the stadium when the gates had already been closed, reduced to a wreck. For him, who had always and only run in Africa, the fatigue and sense of dizziness caused by running at 12,000 feet of altitude were enormous. There was also the pain of a fall that had left him limping and bleeding, but all these things did not make him deflect from the decision to complete the race. Even the Honduran athlete Leda Diaz de Cano found it difficult to go on at the 1984 Los Angeles Olympics, with a temperature of 32°C. After twelve miles she was already half an hour behind, a gap that was increasing. But the officials in charge had to struggle to convince her to withdraw!
A figure that has never been lacking at the Olympics is that of the prankster. One of them went into action at the 1972 Munich Olympics. The marathon runner Frank Shorter, already bruised from colliding with a TV van at the start of the race, heard a shout of disapproval from the spectators as he prepared to enter the stadium as the winner, for which he could not find a reason. In reality, the public's reaction was directed at a German student, Norbert Sudhaus, who, wanting to play a joke, had slipped onto the marathon course about a kilometer from the finish line and, fresh as a rose, had entered the stadium pretending to be the winner. As soon as the audience realized the deception, they vented with a hurricane of "boos" of derision and whistling. Another joker made himself protagonist on the occasion of the Rome Olympics. Walking along via Cristoforo Colombo with a colander on his head, he told everyone he was the cook of the Lunar Olympic delegation, come from space to participate in the games. He also tried to enter the Olympic Village, but to his great surprise, he was denied access.