Olympic Games

International athletic competition comprising two separate 4-year cycles, the Summer Olympics and the Winter Olympics. The two cycles alternate in even-numbered years to give the world an Olympic spectacle every two years.

History

Planning for the modern games began in 1894, with the founding of the International Olympic Committee (IOC). Largely through the efforts of the French sportsman and educator Baron Pierre de Coubertin (1863-1937), the IOC enlisted the aid of sports organizations and individuals of various countries, chiefly European at first. A modified revival of the ancient Greek Olympic Games (see Olympian Games), the modern games were inaugurated in the spring of 1896 in Athens. This competition evolved into the Summer Olympics. The Winter Olympics were begun in 1924 and were held in the same year as the summer games until the 1994 winter games in Lillehammer, Norway, when the alternating cycles began.

Political contentions have increasingly interfered with an avowed aim of the modern Olympics, that of fostering international amity. At the 1936 Olympics in Berlin, Adolf Hitler refused to recognize the achievements of Jesse Owens, a black American who won four gold medals. The 1972 games, held in Munich, West Germany, were marked by a tragedy growing out of political conditions in the Middle East. Members of an Arab guerrilla organization killed two Israeli athletes and took nine hostages, who were later killed along with five of the guerrillas and a West German policeman in a gun battle with police at a Munich airport. Olympic activities were suspended for a day to hold memorial services for the murdered Israeli athletes. The 1976 games, held in Montréal, were also marred by political issues, one of which involved China-Taiwan relations. The host Canadian government refused to allow the Taiwanese team to carry its flag or have its national anthem played at the games, and the Taiwanese thereupon withdrew. A second issue involved most of the black African nations. They demanded that New Zealand be excluded because one of its rugby teams had recently played in South Africa, whose racial policies these black African nations opposed. When their demand was refused, 31 nations withdrew their teams from the competition.

The U.S., after much debate, withdrew from the 1980 games held in Moscow to protest the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan. About 64 other nations also boycotted. The USSR, citing doubts about security measures, withdrew from the 1984 games in Los Angeles; 15 other nations followed suit. One hundred sixty nations participated in the 1988 Olympics in Seoul, South Korea; the lone political controversy centered around North Korea's unsuccessful bid to serve as cohost.

The 1992 Olympics in Barcelona, Spain, reflected a changed political landscape: the 172 participating nations and territories included the Unified Team (with athletes from 12 former Soviet republics), a reunited Germany, and South Africa, which was allowed to compete for the first time since 1960.

During the 1996 summer games in Atlanta, Ga., a bomb went off at Centennial Olympic Park, killing 2 (1 as a result of a heart attack) and injuring 111 others. In 1998 the U.S. Department of Justice named Eric Robert Rudolph (1966-    ) as a suspect in the case; he was also named as a suspect in other bombings, including those of an abortion clinic and a nightclub in Atlanta in 1997 and an abortion clinic in Birmingham, Ala., in 1998. Placed on the Federal Bureau of Investigation's "Ten Most Wanted" list, Rudolph spent five years eluding authorities in the heavily forested southern Appalachian Mountains, until he was captured and arrested in May 2003. In April 2005 he pleaded guilty to the Birmingham bombing and the Atlanta bombings.

Teams from 199 nations and territories took part in the 2000 Summer Olympics in Sydney, Australia. Three nations--Eritrea, the Federated States of Micronesia, and Palau--competed for the first time, and four athletes from East Timor participated as "Individual Olympic Athletes." Also, North and South Korea entered the games under one flag, although they competed as separate countries.

A record 202 nations participated in the 2004 Summer Olympics in Athens, Greece, where the games were held for the first time since the original modern Olympiad 108 years earlier. It was the most expensive Olympic Games of all time, costing about $4.5 billion; the first Olympics to be held since the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks on the U.S., an unprecedented $1.5 billion of that amount was spent on security measures, such as NATO protection of Greece's airspace and long coastline. American athletes dominated in the track-and-field competitions and swimming meets and overall won 103 medals (35 gold, 39 silver, 29 bronze), the most medals of any nation. This number was up from 97 in 2000 but lower than the U.S. teams' record high of 108, in 1992 (Barcelona, Spain). Russia was second in total medals, with 92, and China was third, with 63. Also, a record 24 athletes were expelled for drug violations as of the closing ceremony. Medals in 7 events, including 3 golds, were taken away for doping violations.

Regulation

The IOC, headquartered in Lausanne, Switzerland, sets and enforces Olympic policy. As of 2004 it recognized 202 national Olympic committees, including the U.S. Olympic Committee (USOC), founded in 1900 and headquartered in Colorado Springs, Colo. The site of the games is chosen, usually at least six years in advance, by the IOC. In 1999 evidence revealing that local organizing groups had sought to influence the selection of Olympic sites by disbursing cash and other gifts to IOC officials tarnished the reputation of the IOC and led by midyear to the resignation or expulsion of ten IOC members; a commission appointed by the USOC called for an overhaul of the IOC and its site selection process.

Changes in Competition

The 1896 games in Athens attracted athletes from the U.S., Great Britain, and 11 other nations. Only 42 events in 9 sports were scheduled for these games. Since that small start, several significant trends have emerged: progressively superior performances by successive generations of Olympic athletes; increased participation of women, who were first admitted to Olympic competition in 1912; an increase in world class, medal-winning performances from athletes of smaller nations; and a steady rise in the number of sports and events open to competition.

Since the 1904 games, in which most of the contestants were from the U.S., more and more nations have entered teams in the Olympics. The total number of participating athletes has also grown from the 285 who competed in the first modern games in Athens to the more than 10,500 who competed in the 2000 summer games in Sydney, Australia. At the same time, the Olympic tryouts--elimination games conducted quadrennially under the auspices of the various national Olympic committees--have become important athletic events in themselves.

The medal sports in the 2000 Olympics included archery, badminton, baseball, basketball, beach volleyball, boxing, canoeing-kayaking, cycling, diving, equestrian sports, fencing, field hockey, gymnastics, judo, modern pentathlon (riding, cross-country running, swimming, shooting, and fencing), rhythmic gymnastics, rowing, sailing, shooting, soccer, softball, swimming, synchronized swimming, table tennis, taekwondo, team handball, tennis, track and field, trampoline, triathlon, volleyball, water polo, weight lifting, and wrestling. In all, 300 medal events were held that year.

Although much smaller in scope than the summer games, the Winter Olympics has also grown through the years. The 1980 games in Lake Placid, N.Y., saw 37 countries compete in 39 medal events; at the 1998 games in Nagano some 72 nations competed in 68 events. A total of eight sports were included in the winter Olympics in 1998: biathlon (cross-country skiing and rifle marksmanship), bobsledding, curling (for the first time), ice hockey (which included women's hockey for the first time), luge, figure skating, speed skating , and skiing, which, for the first time, included snowboarding as a medal sport.

In July 2005 the country-members of the IOC voted to drop baseball and softball from the 2012 Olympics.

Scoring

The Olympic games are competitions of individual athletes, not of nations, and the IOC does not keep national scores; however, the media of all nations report national standings according to one of two scoring systems. In the point system of scoring, 10 points are credited for first place in the various events, 5 points for second place, 4 points for third place, 3 points for fourth place, 2 points for fifth place, and 1 point for sixth place. The other scoring system lists the number of medals won by each nation.

Ceremonies

An elaborate ceremony traditionally opens both the Summer and the Winter Olympics. The athletes parade into the stadium led by the Greek team, in honor of the founding of the Olympic games, with the host nation marching in last. The Olympic Hymn is then played and the official Olympic flag (five interlocking rings on a white background) is raised. A runner then enters the stadium bearing the Olympic torch (first introduced at the 1936 summer Olympics), lit by rays of the sun at Olympia, Greece, and carried to the present site by a relay of runners. The ceremony closes with the release of doves, symbolizing the spirit of the games.

Olympic Champions

For many years, the Olympic games were a venue for amateur athletes. Today, however, professionals compete alongside amateurs. In 1992, for the first time, the U.S. sent professionals (in basketball) to compete in the summer games, in Barcelona, Spain. Beginning with these and the 1994 winter games in Lillehammer, the U.S. Olympic Committee has awarded cash prizes to American participants. Other countries may also offer cash prizes and other incentives to their athletes.    A.B.; rev. by B.G.  

Summer Olympic Champions

Track and Field--Men, Marathon
Year	Winner	Time
1896	Spiridon Loues, Greece	2h. 58m. 50s
1900	Michel Theato, France	2h. 59m. 45s
1904	Thomas Hicks, United States	3h. 28m. 63s
1908	John J. Hayes, United States	2h. 55m. 18.4s
1912	Kenneth McArthur, South Africa	2h. 36m. 54.8s
1920	Hannes Kolehmainen, Finland	2h. 32m. 35.8s
1924	Albin Stenroos, Finland	2h. 41m. 22.6s
1928	A.B. El Ouafi, France	2h. 32m. 57s
1932	Juan Zabala, Argentina	2h. 31m. 36s
1936	Kijung Son, Japan (Korean)	2h. 29m. 19.2s
1948	Delfo Cabrera, Argentina	2h. 34m. 51.6s
1952	Emil Zatopek, Czechoslovakia	2h. 23m. 03.2s
1956	Alain Mimoun, France.	2h. 25m.
1960	Abebe Bikila, Ethiopia	2h. 15m. 16.2s
1964	Abebe Bikila, Ethiopia	2h. 12m. 11.2s
1968	Mamo Wolde, Ethiopia	2h. 20m. 26.4s
1972	Frank Shorter, United States	2h. 12m. 19.8s
1976	Waldemar Cierpinski, E. Germany	2h. 09m. 55s
1980	Waldemar Cierpinski, E. Germany	2h. 11m. 03s
1984	Carlos Lopes, Portugal	2h. 09m. 21s*
1988	Gelindo Bordin, Italy	2h. 10m. 32s
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