Bill Sykes' Newsletter
from America.
(September 2004)
An ex-Brit gives his views-(without fear
or favor)---of the American Scene
A brief history of the Olympic games.
 The ancient Olympic games, which are said to have begun
in the year 776BC, (when a Greek cook by the name of
Koroibos won a 600 feet long foot race at the Stadion
track at Olympia), were primarily a part of a religious
festival in honour of Zeus the father of the Greek Gods
and Goddesses.
By the way the Olympic games was named
after Mount Olympos which in Greek mythology was said
to have been the home of some of the greatest Greek Gods
and Goddesses.
From the year 776BC the games were held
every four years for almost 12 Centuries. Literary and
Archaeological evidence however suggest that the games
may have been held as early as the 9th or 10th Century
BC. The early Olympic games were contested by male citizens,
who came from every corner of the Greek Empire to compete
in Olympia.
In addition to the male Olympics there was a separate festival, where foot
races were conducted between unmarried females to honour Hera (The wife of
Zeus), but the date of the initiation of this festival is not known.
 It is claimed that the Greek athletes of the ancient
Olympic games were pure of mind and body and that they
trained and competed for no other reason than the love
of fair competition and to honour their Gods. A far cry
from modern expectations--perhaps current day athletes
should take an "Olive Leaf" out of the ancient
Olympian books.
Although the "ancient" games were staged
in Olympia, Greece, from 776 BC through 393 AD, it took
fifteen hundred and three years until the first "modern"
Olympics were reinstated and held in Athens, Greece,
in 1896.
Some interesting facts:
The Marathon was not an event
of the ancient Olympic games and is a modern event that
was introduced in the Modern Olympic Games of 1896 where
a Marathon event was completed over a distance of 40
Kilometres.
The name Marathon was established to commemorate the
run of Pheidippides an ancient runner who carried the
news of the Persian landing at Marathon to Sparta,
(a distance of 149 miles), in 490 BC.
The Olympic Flame
was first inaugurated in the1928 Olympic games in Amsterdam,
and the Olympic Torch relay was first instituted at
the 1936 Olympics in Berlin, Germany.
The introduction of events for women in the Modern
Olympics:
The first women’s Marathon was held at the1984 games in Los Angeles,
USA.
Women’s Softball made its debut at the Olympic games in Atlanta, USA,
in 1996.
(I understand that Women’s Softball will not be included in future Olympic
tournaments).
The first time women’s hockey became an Olympic sport was at the Olympic
games held in Nagano, Japan, in 1998.
The following women’s events were first introduced at the Olympic games
held in Sydney, Australia, in the year 2000:
Water polo, pole vaulting, trampoline, synchronized diving, hammer throwing.
The introduction of such "sports" as, wind surfing, synchronized
swimming, (a marvellous spectacle), beach style volley ball, women’s
air rifle shooting, etc, and other dubiously named athletic sporting activities
are probably in some peoples minds akin to introducing tiddley-winks and
marbles, etc, as Olympic athletic sporting events.
We welcome feedback about any of the contents of these
newsletters. Please send all correspondence to bill_sykes@huddersfield1.co.uk
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