The 11th Olympic Games of the modern era was held in Berlin in 1936. It would go down in history as the “Nazi Games,” a vehicle of unabashed self-promotion for Adolf Hitler and his regime. The Nazis had hoped the Games would provide a clear demonstration of Aryan superiority and a vindication of their doctrine of the master race. Never before had politics intruded so brazenly into sports, making for a very interesting and controversial Olympics.

10The Counter-Olympics

As Berlin prepared to host the 1936 Olympics, many people were already suspicious of Nazi ideology and agenda. Sports insiders were particularly disturbed by reports of persecution of Jewish athletes. Many within the Olympic organization felt that participating in the coming Games was tantamount to showing support of the Nazi regime. Calls for boycott began to be heard. The debate was particularly intense in the United States, which traditionally fielded the largest team in the Olympics.

Other countries also had groups opposed to the Games. The new republic of Spain went beyond plans for a boycott and proposed an anti-Nazi counter-Olympics to be held in Barcelona, the city that lost out to Berlin in the 1931 vote for the host city. Barcelona had been greatly disappointed at the decision, believing that it was well prepared to hold the Games. Barcelona already had new, modern facilities used in the 1929 International Exposition, plus the Hotel Olimpico that could house the athletes.

Spain was determined to take the glory away from Hitler and the Nazi propaganda machine. Invitations to the “People’s Olympics” were sent out and answered by radical and left-wing athletes from around the world, including the US. There were German athletes who joined to protest the regime at home. Communists, socialists, anarchists—Barcelona swarmed with players of every leftist stripe, 6,000 athletes from 22 countries in all. To call out Nazi bigotry and racism, the emblem of the People’s Olympics depicted three muscled athletes: one white, one black, and the last of mixed ethnicity. The warm and fraternal atmosphere in Barcelona was evident.

But then, just 24 hours before the opening ceremony, the fascist General Francisco Franco launched the military revolt against the government. The Spanish Civil War had begun, in which Hitler would support Franco and the Nationalists. The People’s Olympics was canceled. Nevertheless, individual players had spoken out their conscience and shamed the Nazis. Eventually, Spain and the USSR would be the only countries to boycott Berlin. Barcelona got the chance to host an Olympic party—legitimate this time—in 1992.

9The Nazi Origins Of The Torch Relay

No moment better defines the modern Olympics than the torch relay, a moving symbol of international brotherhood and cooperation. From the lighting of the sacred flame in Olympia, Greece, to its spectacular entrance into the stadium, it cannot fail to excite and electrify. That’s what German Minister of Propaganda Joseph Goebbels wanted spectators to experience—not for brotherhood but for the glory of the Nazi regime.

Not many people know that the torch relay is a Nazi invention. The ancient Greeks did run relay races that involved flames as part of their worship to the gods. But all the modern Games before Berlin did not have a torch relay. The idea was not actually Goebbels’s. It was proposed by Carl Diem, secretary general of the Games’ organizing committee and inspired by the flame that burned at the Amsterdam Olympiad in 1928. Goebbels decided to squeeze the last drop of propaganda mileage out of the torch relay, which satisfied Nazi thirst for spectacle and ceremony.

At the lighting ceremony in Greece, the flame was dedicated to Hitler as the band played the Nazi anthem Die Fahne Hoch. By depicting the relay as an ancient tradition, the Nazis were proclaiming themselves heirs of civilization’s progress from Greece, to Rome, and finally to Germany. The torch’s 2,500-kilometer (1,500 mi) route to Berlin passed through Czechoslovakia, where it provoked a clash between ethnic Germans and Czechs. On the last stage of the relay, only blond and blue-eyed athletes were allowed to bear the torch.

Just as Goebbels had hoped, the stirring sight of the flame being carried into the stadium by a fine specimen of Aryan manhood impressed spectators into concluding that the Nazis were strong but not brutal. The New York Times reported that Germany showed “goodwill” and “flawless hospitality.” The Associated Press assured its readers that the Games betokened peace in Europe.

The hollowness of Nazi propaganda was revealed by the catastrophic war years. Nevertheless, at the resumption of the Olympics in London in 1948, the torch relay was retained with a brighter message of friendship and peace. It still remains a symbol of goodwill, one legacy of Nazism we decided was worth keeping.

8Pigeons Poop On Der Fuhrer’s Show

The opening ceremony was a dazzling display of German power. Hitler’s motorcade bore down avenues bedecked with swastikas to the Olympic stadium. In the skies above Berlin, the airship Hindenburg majestically swept the clouds. The Fuhrer and the Nazi hierarchy proceeded down the steps into the arena, to the screams of the delirious and worshipful crowd of 100,000. Here were the gods of the new Olympus. It was Hitler’s day, his moment of glorification. But it seemed the birds had other ideas.

Louis Zamperini, a runner in the US Olympic team, recalled the Chaplinesque moment worthy of Hitler’s mustache when thousands pigeons were released. “And then they shot a cannon and (it) scared the poop out of the pigeons. Literally scared the poop out of them. And we had straw hats and you could hear the pitter-patter on our hats. I mean it was a mass of droppings and it was so funny.” With typical American bravado, Zamperini would later steal the swastika flag hanging outside Hitler’s office building, the Reich Chancellery, outrunning the guards and keeping the flag as a souvenir.

There were other comedies of error. The New Zealand team mistook a German standing erect in front and to the left of Hitler’s dais for the Fuhrer himself and removed their hats to this imposing figure. They then put them on again as they passed Hitler. The spectators apparently misread the French team’s Olympic salute (right arm thrust out sideways) as the Nazi salute (arm out front) and cheered their traditional enemy in genuine approbation. Of all the national teams, only the US refused to lower their flags to Hitler, and an official statement explained the controversial failure to dip the flag as a matter of army regulations.

Another embarrassing incident during the first day involved Liechtenstein and Haiti. Like someone at a party discovering another wearing a similar dress, the Liechtenstein team was surprised that the national flag of Haiti was of the same blue and red pattern as Liechtenstein’s. This spelled potential mix-up in the medal ceremonies. Fortunately, Haiti’s only athlete withdrew, and Liechtenstein didn’t win any medals. To prevent future confusion, Liechtenstein added a crown to its flag a year later.

7The First Televised Games

The 1936 Berlin Olympics was the world’s first televised sporting event. The games were broadcast by the German firms Telefunken and Fernseh. Twenty-one cameras, three of which were the 2-meter-long (6 ft) Fernsehkanonen (“television cannon”), provided live transmission over a 72-hour period to special viewing booths called “Public Television Offices” in Berlin and Potsdam. Around Berlin, 150,000 people crowded into the 28 viewing rooms.

The primitive RCA and Farnsworth equipment produced only fuzzy black-and-white images. But in 1936, it was significant progress from following games via radio, which was how sports fans tuned in since 1921, when Pittsburgh’s KDKA began broadcasting boxing, later followed by baseball and football. It was also a German technological coup that it had beaten the US in the TV race. The Germans conveniently ignored that they were using a technology pioneered by Vladimir Zworykin, a Russian Jew, and Philo Farnsworth, a Mormon—two men whose ethnic and religious backgrounds would have earned them the contempt of the Nazis.

The Germans knew they were engineering the future. The program guide Television In Germany concludes: “From these initial stages of television in broadcasting and telephony, there is a growing up a cultural development that promises to be of unsuspected importance to the progress of mankind.”

America did have one consolation. The first broadcast showed Jesse Owens winning the 100-meter final. It was ironic that German technology would show the African-American Owens stomping on the notion of Aryan superiority.

6Jesse Owens And His Nazi Shoes

Jesse Owens won four golds in Berlin, for the 100 meters, 200 meters, long jump, and 4×100 meter relay. He was the acknowledged superstar of the Olympics. What is less known is that he got a little help from a member of the Nazi Party named Adolf “Adi” Dassler, a shoemaker whose company, Gebruder Dassler Schuhfabrik, specialized in track and field footwear. Dassler came to the Olympic Village with the intention of having as many athletes as possible wear his shoes. Dassler did not have the marketing and advertising tools to promote his brand, so everything had to be done by word of mouth.

Dassler approached his friend and the coach of the German track team, Jo Waitzer, who supported his endeavor to design running shoes that would improve the performance of track athletes. Waitzer agreed to persuade the runners even from other national teams to try out the shoes. Having read about Owens’s performances in the Olympic trials, Dassler was particularly interested in getting the shoes on the American’s agile feet. Dassler urged Waitzer to hand out some shoes to Owens. The coach was hesitant, as he knew his life could be put in danger if the authorities ever found out he was in contact with the African-American star.

Nevertheless, Waitzer braved the risk and smuggled two or three pairs to Owens, all personally crafted by Adi himself. They were made of glove leather, reinforced at the heels and toes with six track spikes. It was pretty much state-of-the-art at the time. Owens won the 100 meters in his German shoes, and by the third pair, Owens said he wanted only those shoes or none at all. He became the unwitting first pitchman for the product.

Berlin was soon abuzz that the impressive black American had accomplished his record-setting feats in shoes made in the small German village of Herzogenaurach. Dassler’s sales skyrocketed. It was worldwide prominence after that for the shoe company everyone knows today from Adi Dassler’s name—Adidas.

5The Dirtiest Basketball Final

Berlin showcased the first-ever Olympic basketball competition. Dr. James Naismith, the game’s inventor, received the honor of tossing the ball for the tip-off of the very first game, Estonia vs. France. The USA was the clear favorite, being the sport’s country of origin, and true to expectations, they steamrolled the opposition effortlessly before facing Canada in the finals.

Basketball was meant to be an indoor game, but the German organizers were unfamiliar with basketball (Germany had no basketball team) and failed to provide indoor facilities. Instead, the games were played outdoors on a clay tennis court, where goals with wooden backboards had been installed. The players had to make do with a ball that was bigger and heavier than today’s. There was a slit on one side for the bladder, so the ball wasn’t perfectly round. This made dribbling on the clay difficult, even in dry conditions.

The day before the final, there was a torrential downpour, turning the court into a muddy mess. The Germans wanted to get the game over with and did not call a postponement as the rains continued the next day. Americans squared off with Canadians in the dirt surrounded by 500 spectators. Dribbling was now well-nigh impossible, and the ball was moved up the court chiefly by passing. The slippery court substantially slowed down the game. The German referees, who didn’t speak English, officiated atrociously.

In the midst of these difficult conditions, the score only stood at 14–4 by halftime of the 40-minute regulation period. The US inflicted a crushing 19–8 victory on Canada at the end.

4Hitler’s Football Embarrassment

Adolf Hitler was never a football fan. He believed that building up a physically fit German youth could be better accomplished by sports like boxing and athletics. But the Nazis did support a strong football team that could play a part in the propaganda machine. They organized clubs and encouraged people to play. Football was also the most popular sport and guaranteed to make the Nazis money.

Team manager Otto Nerz made the Germans a powerful football team, and in 1936, it was joint favorite with Great Britain. The first match was a devastating 9–0 triumph over Luxembourg, a spectacle so overwhelming that the officials decided to invite Hitler to the next match against Norway. Hitler had never been to a football game before, but surely he would not want to miss his Aryan superstars dominating the opposition, whom they had defeated in their last eight meetings. This one should be a breeze.

Hitler gave in to his underlings and, with 55,000 other spectators, took his place at the Poststadion, preparing to savor the sweet victory of his Wunderteam. The Germans did not disappoint in the early minutes—the Norwegians hardly made it past the half-line. But then, the Germans began bungling their chances. Norway found an opening and crashed through with the first goal. Hitler was agitated and began to explode in a tantrum. The Germans doubled on the attack, with Nerz ordering the defenders into the action. But another Norwegian shot sailed past the goalie. Hitler had seen enough. He rose up in an uncontrollable rage and left his first and only football game in a huff. The score was 2–0 for Norway at the final whistle.

3Leni Riefenstahl’s Olympia

The 1936 Games came to be immortalized on film, using pioneering moviemaking techniques that changed cinema forever. The monumental masterpiece was Olympia, directed by Leni Riefenstahl. Unlike the blatant celebration of Nazi power in her earlier Triumph of the Will, Riefenstahl’s heroes in Olympia were those who genuinely excelled, regardless of nationality or race. Aside from spectacle, Riefenstahl emphasized the beauty of the human form. To accomplish this, she manipulated the camera lens in ways never done before.

Riefenstahl was one of the first to use a moving camera for traveling shots in a documentary, putting her crew on roller skates as they took the footage. She built a track so the camera could move alongside the sprinters. She had a pit dug so she could film the pole vault against the backdrop of the sky. Riefenstahl developed a special 600-mm telephoto lens for close-ups and compact shots and sent aloft a balloon with a small 5-mm camera for aerial views. An underwater camera that changed speed and focus skillfully managed the tempo of the different diving events.

Riefenstahl edited the shots for maximum dramatic impact. The transition shots from one event to the next were wonderfully fluid. Close-ups captured the sweat and strain of marathon runners, their exhaustion and determination to go on. This was interspersed with crowd reaction shots with synchronized background music giving the athletes’ movements the impression of a dance. This was back in the days when to simply attach any sound to film was difficult. But Riefenstahl did it with impressive precision that stunned audiences. Never before had a documentary been produced with editing and sound.

There is controversy over whether Olympia was overt propaganda or not. On one hand, Goebbels clearly was involved in the film. On the other hand, Riefenstahl featured African Americans Jesse Owens and Ralph Metcalf, whose successes Hitler clearly resented. She was also not averse to recording German defeats at the hands of other competitors. Later on, Riefenstahl left overtly Nazi footage on the cutting room floor. Nevertheless, the Nazis used the feel-good and inspirational theme of Olympia to reflect back on the regime.

Olympia won the grand prize at the 1938 International Film Festival in Venice, beating Disney’s Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs. Disney himself welcomed Riefenstahl to Hollywood with open arms, the only studio executive to do so in the wake of Kristallnacht. Even today, Olympia‘s brilliant cinematography continues to mesmerize.

2Art As Sport

Once upon a time, the Olympics awarded medals for art. It was founder Pierre de Coubertin’s vision that the Games should highlight aesthetics as well as athletics. Every Olympics between 1912 and 1948 awarded gold, silver, and bronze in five categories: architecture, painting, sculpture, literature, and music. All works had to be sports-themed—paintings, for example, could feature athletes in action, while musical pieces might pay homage to a sport or an individual competitor. The German Art Committee proposed to add a Works for the Screen category for 1936, but de Coubertin apparently smelled a rat and turned it down, sensing that it would be a vehicle for purely propaganda films.

In Berlin, the Germans dominated the art competition jury, taking liberties with home court advantage to remedy the situation that saw Germany haul in just one medal in the last two Olympics. Remedy it did—German artists won five out of the nine medals handed out. German musicians made a clean sweep of the Musical Composition Solo and Chorus categories. The only American to win a medal was Charles Downing Lay, with his Architecture entry “Marine Park in Brooklyn.”

Initially, the public showed no enthusiasm for the art competition. But a flurry of propaganda eventually interested 70,000 people to view the exhibition, making it one of the most successful Olympic art competitions. We can only speculate how much money the Nazis raked in from the sales of the artworks, as transactions were made “without the usual formalities,” according to the official report. To the delight of de Coubertin, however, the award-winning musical compositions were played by the Berlin Philharmonic in a concert at the end of the Games.

The amateurism clause of the Olympics eventually killed the art competition. The quality of the entries never seemed to satisfy the jury of art critics, and it became the practice to withhold medals and proclaim no winner. It was discontinued after the 1948 London Olympics.

1Elizabeth Robinson’s Unbelievable Comeback

Elizabeth Robinson’s gold in 1936 came five years after she was given up for dead, her battered body taken to a mortician for burial.

Betty was a native of the Chicago suburb of Riverdale and attended Thornton Township High School. One day in 1928, her biology teacher spotted her chasing a commuter train and was astonished at her speed as she caught up with it. After timing her later as she ran 50 meters (150 ft) down the school corridor, the teacher encouraged Betty to join the Illinois Women’s Athletic Club. Soon, Betty was clocking near-record times at competitive events. In July, she passed the trials and made it to the 1928 Olympics US team.

At 16, having never been away from home, Betty was on a ship to Europe. This was the first time female athletes were allowed in track and field events, over the objections of Baron de Coubertin and Pope Pius XI. In Amsterdam, Betty became the first woman—and the youngest—to win the gold in the 100 meters, setting a world record of 12.2 seconds. She returned to the US a heroine and continued to break records thereafter.

Then, on a hot June day in 1931, tragedy struck. Betty was with her cousin Wilson Palmer in a biplane 200 meters (600 ft) up when the plane stalled and nosedived. The horrific impact left both unconscious. The man who pulled Betty from the debris saw her mangled body and bloody face and thought he was looking at a corpse. He put her in the trunk of his car to a nursing home and left her with the undertaker there. Fortunately, the undertaker noticed she was still alive, and she was taken to the emergency room.

Betty drifted in and out of consciousness for 11 weeks while she was in the hospital. Doctors repaired her damaged left leg by inserting a rod and pins to stabilize it. Doctors feared Betty would never walk again. The media proclaimed her running days over. Betty’s left leg became half an inch shorter than the right. She was in a wheelchair for four months. It was a crushing blow for Betty, who wanted to defend her 100-meter title at the 1932 Los Angeles Olympics.

But with grim determination, Betty struggled to walk then run again. By 1934, she was back in training. She missed LA, but was ready for Berlin as a member of the 4×100 relay team. Since Betty’s shortened leg made her unable to start in the crouch position, she was allowed to start standing up. Betty ran the third leg, handing over her baton as the favored German team fumbled and dropped theirs. The Americans surged forward, giving Betty Robinson her improbable second Olympic gold. The International Olympic Committee called her comeback “one of the most remarkable in the annals of the Games.”

Betty retired from competition soon after and married Richard Schwartz in 1939. She continued as a coach and gave talks to athletic associations across the US. Elizabeth Robinson Schwartz died in 1999, an almost forgotten Olympic heroine.

+The Muslim Women Who Snubbed Hitler

Halet Cambel personified the new Turkish woman in the 1930s. She exemplified the transformation of Muslim Turkey into a modern secular state led by Mustafa Kemal Ataturk, where women received the same rights and opportunities as men.

Cambel was born in Berlin to a family with close connections to Kemal. She was a sickly child, falling prey to typhoid and then to hepatitis. Cambel got herself into shape with exercise. She was fascinated by stories of knights, which led her to take up fencing under a Russian coach. She returned to Istanbul in 1924 to study archaeology, but her fencing skills earned her a place in the 1936 Turkish Olympic team with fellow fencer Suat Fetgeri Aseni Tari. They were the first Turkish women to compete in the Games. Cambel was repulsed by Nazi ideology and did not want to go, but the Turkish government prodded her to participate. Her disgust toward Hitler must have been heightened when she saw the Fuhrer’s infuriated reaction to Jesse Owens’s victory.

Cambel and Tari did not win any medals, but they will be remembered as the women who defied Hitler. Cambel recalled the moment: “Our assigned German official asked us to meet Hitler. We actually would not have come to Germany at all if it were down to us, as we did not approve of Hitler’s regime. We said that we would never have come to Berlin if our government had not told us to do so. When the official asked us to go up and introduce ourselves to Hitler, we firmly rejected her offer.”

Halet Cambel settled down to life as an archaeologist after the Olympics.

Larry is a freelance writer whose main interest is history.

The Olympics remain one of the most prestigious sporting events in the world. Countries all over the world spend enormous amounts of money, athletes dedicate their lives to training, and enthusiasts come from everywhere to watch the games. However, while this all seems good on the surface, many shocking revelations have come to light.

10 Russia Had An Untraceable Drug For The Sochi Winter Olympics

Before the 2014 Sochi Winter Olympics, the World Anti-Doping Agency received word that there was a human growth hormone (HGH) available in Russia that was completely untraceable by any standard Olympics drug test. If true, that would have given the Russians a huge advantage in virtually every sport in the Winter Olympics that year. So the question on everyone’s mind was: How true was this claim?

German broadcaster WDR (which has a reliable reputation in the media) was behind the shocking report. They sent undercover reporters to the Russian Academy of Sciences in Moscow. There, they interviewed a scientist who claimed that an untraceable HGH had been created called full-size MGF, which had been previously tested on animals.

In the words of the scientist, it “works two times faster than a normal muscle tonic and cannot be detected by the doping authorities.” He then went on to say that it would cost €100,000 to “prepare” an athlete for the Winter Olympics.

It is well-known that there are stringent testing standards that improve constantly, so most coaches and athletes wouldn’t even risk supposedly “untraceable” drugs. Nevertheless, it was claimed that some athletes would not pass up the opportunity to have a possible advantage.

This became even more of a worry when full-size MGF was tested by German scientists. They proved how effective the drug really was. Luckily, new testing was developed to help prevent abuse of supposedly “untraceable” drugs.

9 The 2016 Rio Olympics Have Been Brutal On The Locals

Ever since Rio de Janeiro was given the rights to host the Olympics in 2016, the Brazilian government has been displacing the locals to prepare for the games. While some say this is just about the games, others claim that there is an ulterior motive.

It has been reported that the Brazilian government is deliberately destroying poor neighborhoods to make way for infrastructure for the coming events. Specifically, several locals were forced out of their homes so that a high-speed bus lane could be built from the international airport to Barra de Tijuca, the neighborhood where most of the Olympic events will be held.

Since 2009, over 22,000 families have been moved from their homes because their homes were labeled “at risk” or, more likely, in the way of proposed Olympic developments. Many families haven’t received any compensation for the destruction of their homes due to legal issues surrounding much of the property.

Most of these families have been resettled in government developments far from the inner city where they are employed, which causes untold economic hardships. The government claims that only 344 families—all living in the favela of Vila Autodromo—have been resettled due to the Olympics.

According to housing activists, the Rio city officials have been using the Olympic developments as a way of segregating the rich and the poor in the city. The housing developments to which many people are moved have no convenient bus routes for commuters, no local schools, increased utility costs, and unofficial “militias” that extort money from the residents in return for security.

8 Chinese Abuse In The London Olympics

In many countries, winning the gold in the Olympics is the only way to prove your worth. If you fail, you’re considered a social pariah; if you win, then you become a national hero. To achieve the top prize, many coaches and athletes will go to extreme lengths to become and remain a victor.

China is one of the nations where this happens. During the 2012 London Olympics, allegations emerged that Chinese coaches were grossly abusing their teams. Apparently, their heartless behavior begins as soon as the athlete is recruited.

Once children show a talent for sports in China, they are immediately uprooted and isolated from their families so that they can train without distractions. Coaches often deliberately withhold news from their athletes, no matter how personal, to reduce stress that is unrelated to the sport.

Such was the case with Olympic diver Wu Minxia. She was not told that her mother had died from cancer until after she had completed her routine during the 2012 Olympics. However, she had been so emotionally removed from her parents that when she received the news, she showed no sadness and claimed that her team was her “family.”

Many coaches have also claimed that the Chinese routinely use physical abuse to control their athletes. One coach said, “The women are literally beat into submission.”

They claim that this abuse starts at a younger, more vulnerable age. Eventually, the coaches are able to dictate the athletes’ every waking moment. The enormous cash bonuses offered by the Chinese to Olympic winners apparently encourage this extreme behavior.

7 USA Competitive Swimming Sex Scandal

A frightening trend has been discovered among American competitive swim coaches. Although it has long been unnoticed or simply ignored, some coaches have been sexually abusing their athletes. Several coaches have received harsh punishments for their behavior, but this has done nothing to scare others into following the law.

As of 2014, at least 100 competitive swim coaches have been given lifetime bans for sexual abuse. Many of these men were and are repeat offenders. For example, swim coach Andy King was convicted of 15 sexual abuse charges. These repeated offenses occurred mainly because this sort of behavior was swept under the rug to protect the integrity of the sport.

Much like other sex offenders, the coaches use a process known as “grooming” in which they build up the trust and affection of a young athlete as a means to an end. What starts as an innocent “friendship” eventually deteriorates into sexual abuse. The coaches do this by giving a warped sense of intimacy to their victims, which these young athletes accept as normal.

This type of exploitation may have flourished in an era when athletes remained quiet. But people are more willing to reveal the truth today. With such a clear-cut pattern and witness confirmations, it would stand to reason that the authorities are devoting more effort to combating this abuse.

The Olympics and the US government have begun to crack down on hurtful behaviors toward young athletes, but many instances of abuse are not recognized. Therefore, many people believe that there is far more abuse than officially reported.

6 The Olympics Are A White Elephant

A white elephant is a possession that can’t be sold for any real profit and that is expensive to maintain. Such is the case with the Olympics. Many cities don’t earn a profit from hosting this prestigious event. Today, the Olympics have become less of a cash cow and more of an expensive trophy to show off the superiority of the host country and city.

In 2004, Athens budgeted $1.5 billion to host the games but ultimately spent an astounding $16 billion, an astronomical sum for a cash-strapped country like Greece. Montreal spent so much for the 1976 Olympics that it took 30 years for the city to pay off its debts. Rio de Janeiro has already spent $25 billion on infrastructure for those watching and participating in the 2016 Olympics.

It has become a multibillion-dollar game of keeping up with the Joneses for each successive host city. To show off their economic superiority, the latest host tries to one-up the previous hosts.

Many of the extravagant construction projects undertaken by host cities are short-term. When the Olympics are over, lavish facilities are often left to deteriorate for the simple reason that no one wants to use them.

This is why many American cities—Boston, San Francisco, Los Angeles, and Washington—have been reluctant to lobby for the title of host city. Make no mistake, a few of the games have been profitable: Los Angeles 1984, Barcelona 1992, and Seoul 1998 were all financial boons for the host cities.

However, for many countries, profits don’t matter. The extravagant expenses are an investment in propaganda pieces to show off the supposed financial strength of their country. In 2008, the Beijing Olympics were considered a success because of the prestige the event brought to China.

However, the 2004 Athens Olympics were a failure because Greece overestimated the event’s profit potential—a mistake that helped to plunge the country into bankruptcy. Most experts agree that the Olympics are less of a financial opportunity and more of an expensive party.

5 Olympic Athletes Have A Hard Time Becoming Normal

What it means to be “normal” depends on one’s perspective. But we can probably agree that the life of an Olympic athlete is far different from that of most people.

They begin training at an extremely young age, dedicating their lives and sacrificing youthful experiences so that they can have a shot at achieving athletic greatness. But once that time has passed, their lives radically change. No longer do they spend all of their time training; they now have to become like the rest of us.

This is understandably hard because they have never experienced many of the daily situations that comprise a “normal” life. Diann Roffe, who won the silver in giant slalom in 1992 and the gold for Super G in 1994, announced her retirement from sports when she was 26. Afterward, she spent a long time in a “big bucket of melancholy” because she couldn’t recapture the excitement of being an Olympic athlete.

Still, she was one of the luckier athletes. Some athletes have taken darker and more lethal roads. Scott Miller, a silver medalist in the 1996 Olympics, was arrested for drug possession in 2014. Jeret “Speedy” Peterson, a silver medalist in 2010, struggled with alcoholism and tragically killed himself a year after he won.

When spectacular athletes emerge, they are thrust into the spotlight and showered with media attention. Obviously, being the center of attention can be intoxicating. But once the press moves on, it can be a devastating blow.

Many struggle with their identities and feelings of self-worth because they are now average Joes and have to deal with the realities of life as a regular person. Although some have led well-adjusted lives after the Olympics, many others have struggled to make the transition to normality.

4 Russia May Have Sabotaged The 2012 London Olympics

According to a report by the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA), the Russians sabotaged and intimidated drug testers during the 2012 London Olympics to allow their athletes to get past the drug regulations. The WADA report claimed that the FSB, a successor to the Soviet KGB, was behind this conspiracy. The alleged unethical behavior of the Russians was far-reaching.

First, the FSB offered bribes to officials. Then independent drug-testing officials were intimidated and spied on. FSB agents also infiltrated the laboratories, tampered with samples, and threatened others in the lab.

Before samples were sent to the WADA-accredited Russian laboratory in Moscow, they were sent to a “shadowy” secondary facility on the outskirts of the city. There, the samples were screened and subsequently altered if they came out positive for performance-enhancing drugs (PEDs).

If positive samples managed to get to the accredited lab, the lab director was bribed with cash payments. In one case, the director supposedly destroyed 1,500 tests when he heard that WADA was going to investigate. Phone calls by Russian officials were found to make frequent references to slang terms for steroids, other stimulants, and PEDs.

As a result of these findings, WADA has called for Russia to be banned from the 2016 games in Rio de Janeiro. Russia claims that WADA doesn’t have the authority to order such an action. As of February 2016, we don’t know if the International Olympic Committee will do anything about these shocking allegations.

3 The Japanese Olympics Are In The Pocket Of The Yakuza

The yakuza is an organized crime syndicate in Japan, which is often thought of as the Japanese Mafia. Although the organization is not illegal, it is regulated. There are over 60,000 members, and many of them are quite public about their association with the yakuza. Despite this, the US Department of the Treasury has imposed sanctions on the Sumiyoshi-kai, the second largest yakuza organization, which is led by Hareaki Fukuda.

So how does this affect the Olympics in Japan? There is a litany of evidence that Hidetoshi Tanaka, the vice-chairman of the Japanese Olympic Committee, is closely tied to Fukuda. Photographs, police reports, other documents, and verified testimony from individuals associated with the yakuza have all shown that the Japanese Olympic Committee is in bed with the yakuza.

Tanaka is friends with Fukuda and at least one person in the Yamaguchi-gumi, another large criminal organization. In addition, former Japanese Prime Minister Yoshiro Mori, who became head of the Tokyo Organizing Committee for the Olympic and Paralympic Games, has been accused of having yakuza ties.

All of this creates quite a problem for the 2020 Olympics in Tokyo. It is illegal for an individual or an organization to associate with or provide funds to the yakuza. If it can be proven that so many top Olympic officials are in the pocket of the yakuza, it could rock the proposed Tokyo Olympics to the core.

Tanaka, who was an amateur sumo champion, has lobbied to have sumo wrestling become an official Olympic sport. In 1996, Tanaka allegedly consulted with Kyo Eichu, the consigliere of the Yamaguchi-gumi, to make this happen.

However, Eichu was prosecuted for financial crimes in 1999 and couldn’t assist Tanaka. This wasn’t the end of Tanaka’s association with the Yamaguchi-gumi, though. There are photographs that show him with the head of the gang in 2005. Despite all of the testimony and evidence against the Japanese Olympic Committee, the 2020 Tokyo Olympics are still going on as planned.

2 The Bidding Process Is Notoriously Corrupt

For the most part, the International Olympic Committee (IOC) chooses a host city for the games according to which city will pay the most money. Unethical? Of course. Effective? Definitely.

Most recently, it was revealed that Turkey was almost going to host the 2020 Olympics, but they didn’t pay bribes. In the end, Japan secured the 2020 Olympics after paying $5 million in sponsorship money to members of the IOC.

This isn’t a new practice. Many still remember the revelation that extensive bribery had led to Salt Lake City hosting the 2002 Winter Olympics. The corruption was so extensive in Salt Lake City that 15 officials faced criminal charges of racketeering, fraud, and conspiracy.

Approximately $1 million was spent on sponsorships to secure the city. But the charges were thrown out by the judge in 2003. Although the federal government’s case failed, it did shine a light on the process of host city selection.

Nevertheless, corruption still exists, as in the case of Tokyo 2020. The main character in this drama is Lamine Diack, the 82-year-old former president of the International Association of Athletics Federation (IAAF), who wanted a $5 million sponsorship for his league.

Turkey refused to pay; Japan didn’t. It’s as simple as that. WADA, which first discovered this information, has said that bribery harms the integrity of the Olympics as much as doping and cheating.

1 Many Of The Events Are Fixed

Recently, several events in the Olympics have been proven to be fixed. However, it’s almost certain that cheating has been going on much longer.

In the 2012 Olympics in London, Azerbaijani boxer Magomed Abdulhamidov was knocked down an incredible five times by Japanese boxer Satoshi Shimuzu. It was one of the most amazing matches in Olympic history, but something unusual happened. Knockdowns are extremely rare in Olympic boxing, but this happened multiple times throughout the match.

The judges gave Azerbaijan the win. Fans booed, but the judges insisted that their ruling was final. Then BBC Newsnight presented evidence that Azerbaijan had paid millions so that two athletes would win gold medals. The match had been fixed.

Evidence showed that Azerbaijan made a $9 million bank transfer to AIBA, which manages Olympic boxing. Of course, AIBA said that the allegations were groundless. But in a twist, AIBA officials upheld Shimuzu’s appeal and gave him the win.

This isn’t the only time that a blatant fix was uncovered. In the 2002 Salt Lake City Winter Olympics, a French judge gave Russian skaters a higher score as part of a deal that would give the French skaters a good score later. Eventually, the Russians and the Canadians were given dual gold medals, and the rules for skating competitions were changed.

After the 2014 Sochi Olympics, there were allegations that the US and Russia had worked together during the skating events. This resulted in a Russian gold medal for team dance while American skaters won for duet. However, as of February 2016, many people don’t believe these allegations, and they have yet to be proven.

Gordon Gora is a struggling author who is desperately trying to make it. He is working on several projects. You can write him at [email protected].

When we think of the Olympics, most of us picture billion-dollar spectacles, professional athletes competing at their absolute physical peak, and a whole world coming together to watch.

That’s the Olympics now. The first modern Olympics in 1896 was an altogether different affair. Only 14 countries competed, professionals were nowhere to be seen, and one of the US teams had to spend their spare time writing news reports on the games because no actual reporters thought they were worth covering. Despite being considered a success at the time, the 1896 Olympics now seems adorably amateur . . . and utterly bizarre.

10Everyone Got Participation Medals

Most modern athletes would kill to own an Olympic medal. Even if it’s only a bronze, it still proves that literally only two people on Earth can do your chosen sport better than you. At least, that’s the case today. In 1896, a bronze medal meant something very different. It simply meant you’d bothered to show up for the games in the first place.

That’s right: The first modern Olympics had participation medals, just like your elementary school’s sports day. At the conclusion of the games, every single male participant (female participants were forbidden) was given a bronze medal designed by Belgian sculptor Godefroid Devreese. Winners got silver medals and olive wreaths, while those who came in second place were given copper medals and laurel crowns. Why the organizers thought copper might be considered better than bronze is anybody’s guess.

The classic medal table, with gold for first, silver for second, and bronze for third didn’t come about until the 1904 games in St. Louis. Thankfully, by that point the committee had given up on the idea of participation medals.

9Australia’s ‘Team’ Entered By Accident And Punched A Spectator

Today, Olympic athletes spend years training for their shot at a medal, in effect turning their entire lives into a prelude for the main event. Not so in 1896. Back then, pretty much anybody could show up and decide to participate. We know this because that’s exactly what happened with Australia’s team.

“Team” might be a little bit of a stretch. Australia only entered a single athlete: a mustachioed man named Edwin Flack, who happened to be in England at the time and hightailed it to Athens to watch the games. Once there, he decided to compete, signing up with the British team for two short-distance races and a tennis doubles match. Since Australia was a colony at the time, it was only retroactively that Flack’s medals for the 100 meters and 1,500 meters were added to Australia’s total medal count. He also signed up for the first marathon, leading to perhaps his finest moment.

Flack had never run long distances before. So when he suddenly found himself doing a marathon in the blazing summer heat, he essentially had a breakdown. After doggedly running for miles on end, he eventually collapsed and had to be helped up by a spectator. By this point, Flack was so delirious that he punched the poor guy who had helped him, knocking him to the ground.

8The Discus Winner Had No Idea What A Discus Was

Most people who want to win a medal get there by practicing and practicing for years on end. Robert Garrett was not most people. An American athlete, he entered the discus event because no other American wanted to. There was only one problem: Garrett had never even seen a discus before.

Prior to his arrival in Athens, Garrett had literally no idea what a discus was. For his training, he asked a local blacksmith to make him one based on ancient Greek manuscripts. In what may well have been an instance of epic 19th-century trolling, the blacksmith built him an iron lump that was 30 centimeters (12 in) across and weighed 14 kilograms (30 lb). It was impossible to throw, but Garrett trained with it anyway. He went to Athens prepared to throw a chunk of iron, and it was only when he saw the Greek team throwing real discuses that he realized just how badly he’d screwed up.

Still, Garrett entered anyway, which went about as well as you’d expect. His first two throws didn’t spin so much as flip end-over-end and nearly hit audience members in the face. Then, something unexpected happened: Garrett made his third and final throw—and won the competition. Years later, one of the other American athletes would recall about this unexpected win: “I think no one was more surprised than Robert Garrett himself.”

7The Marathon Winner’s Life Was A Disney Story

Spyridon “Spyros” Louis is still considered a hero in Greece. A while back, they even stuck his face on the €2 coin, reflecting the depth of feeling the nation still has for their first marathon winner. We can’t say we blame them. Louis’s life was like the most awesome Disney sports movie ever.

A dirt-poor donkey driver, Louis’s life prior to the Olympics involved helping his dad deliver mineral water to houses around Athens (which at that time had no central water supply). Like the underdog in any feel-good movie, Louis entered the marathon just to enjoy his natural talent for running. He then proceeded to run so well that he crossed the finish line in 2 hours 58 minutes, beating every single other competitor.

Despite his Disney-ready story, Louis had at least one moment in the race that was less family-friendly but a hundred times more badass. About halfway through, he ran past his uncle’s tavern. Rather than carrying on, Louis went inside and ordered a glass of wine. He drank it leisurely, told everyone present he was going to win, then headed back out and into Olympic legend.

6The US Athletes Had Their Moms Pay Their Travel Costs

Today, a position on the US Olympic team means getting flown to a distant country, slapped with a sponsorship deal, and given a room in specially constructed Olympic apartments. In 1896, things weren’t quite so glamorous. By that, we mean that a third of the team had to rely on their moms to pay for their travel to Athens.

It’s hard to grasp now just how little interest America had in the original Olympics. There were no trials and no qualifying judges. The only criteria for getting on the US team was an ability to get to Athens in time for the games.

Two of the athletes, James Connolly and William Hoyt, were even denied permission to attend by Harvard officials and had to drop out of university to compete. (Luckily, they both won their events.) Four members of the team, who were studying at Princeton, couldn’t even find an organization willing to pay their travel costs. They would have been unable to compete had discus winner Robert Garrett’s mom not agreed at the last second to fund their journey.

5A Local Woman Gate-Crashed The Marathon (Maybe)

Remember how we said earlier that women were forbidden from participating in the 1896 Olympics? Turns out not every woman in Athens got the memo. Reports from the time claim that a woman who went by the name Melpomene took the exclusion order personally. She went on to gate-crash the marathon in protest.

Depending on the version you read, Melpomene either turned up as a spectator and ran alongside the men or she staged her own separate marathon and loudly demanded to have her feat recognized. The first version ends with her being barred from entering the Olympic arena and defiantly running her victory lap outside it. The second, more depressing take has her spending the next few years petitioning the organizers to recognize her achievement only to be repeatedly beaten back.

Unfortunately, the only records kept of the circus around the first games were often very poor. Today, it’s not even certain Melpomene existed. She may have been confused with Stamata Revithi, a poor local woman who attempted to run the marathon to get rich, and may have managed a time of 5 hours and 30 minutes.

4The US Team Accidentally Covered A King In Orange Peel

In 2012, the London Olympics famously opened with the Queen skydiving out of a helicopter alongside James Bond. Fun as this was, it was obviously staged. Modern royals at the Olympics rarely do anything but watch politely. Greece in 1896 was a different matter. The royal family and the US team got on like a house on fire, leading to a strange afternoon where the Americans tried to teach them baseball . . . and almost caused a minor diplomatic incident.

The incident came courtesy of an orange, a walking stick, and a prince’s formal court uniform. Keen to demonstrate baseball, the US team talked the future King Constantine through the rules, then repurposed a walking stick as a bat and an orange as a ball. They gave the “bat” to the future king, hurled the orange at him . . . and watched in horror as it exploded all over his formal court uniform, covering him in bits of orange.

Luckily, the crown prince turned out to be a good sport and laughed the whole thing off. Still, it marked the end of any attempts to bring baseball into the fold of Greek national sports.

3Nobody Believed The Chilean Athlete Had Participated

We briefly mentioned earlier that historical records involving the 1896 Olympics are kind of awful. To see exactly how awful, look no further than the case of Chilean athlete Luis Subercaseaux. Despite participating in three events, the world almost immediately forgot that he’d bothered to show up. Fast-forward to 2016, and the International Society of Olympic Historians maintains that there were no representatives of Chile at the first games.

At the time, Subercaseaux was with his diplomat father in Europe and went to Athens out of interest in the company of the French team. There, he was allowed to compete in a couple of races for the French but told the delegates he was Chilean at the last minute. When his diplomat father found out he’d done so without consulting the government of Chile, he was furious. Subercaseaux was forced to keep quiet about his participation—an easy task since he didn’t win anything and very few reporters were covering the games.

As a result, many still think Subercaseaux never actually took part. However, the meager evidence that there is suggests he probably did. For one thing, his name is down as a participant for the French team. For another, he later became a respected diplomat who was ambassador to the Vatican, suggesting he’s a credible witness. Still, the fact that an entire athlete could be forgotten shows just how different things were back then.

2It Led To A Rash Of Ridiculous ‘Sports’ In Future Games

Modern Olympic games feature 28 sports across a staggering 300 events. The 1896 version, by contrast, featured a mere nine spread across 43 events (some of which were canceled at the last minute). The driving force behind the modern Olympic phenomenon, Baron de Coubertin, evidently felt that this wasn’t anywhere near enough. To broaden the contest in subsequent games, the organizers introduced a crazy number of new events. Some of them were utterly ridiculous.

The 1900 Olympics, for example, included “sports” like firefighting and kiteflying. Although these are no longer retrospectively counted by the International Olympic Committee (IOC), others from later games are. Among those that won their competitors Olympic medals were sculpture, painting, town planning, and architecture. At one point, you could even win a medal for writing poetry. Hilariously, one of the first poems to win was by Baron de Coubertin himself. It was called “Ode to Sport,” and a few representative lines go like this:

O Sport, You are Peace!
You forge happy bonds between the peoples
by drawing them together in reverence for strength
which is controlled, organized, and self-disciplined.

Clearly, this was a win based on quality, rather than the writer being the head of the Olympics or anything like that.

1It Wasn’t Even The First Modern Olympics

Alongside being a terrible poet, Baron de Coubertin was apparently also something of a thief. Although he billed his 1896 event as the first modern Olympics, that wasn’t strictly true. As far back as 1850, the small English town of Wenlock had been hosting its own “Olympian Games”: a series of athletic tests leading to prizes. De Coubertin visited the town in 1890, aged 27, and decided to steal the idea for himself.

Not that the two events were identical. Wenlock’s Olympian Games were only open to those who lived around Wenlock, which wasn’t very many people. The town’s version was also an annual event, rather than a four-year one. But the basic idea of reviving the ancient Greek custom for the modern world originated here. Without witnessing it, de Coubertin would have never gone on to found the IOC, and nobody in Rio would be playing any sport this summer that wasn’t soccer.

Some of the Wenlock events are even similar to actual Olympic events. There’s a 1-mile race (comparable to the 1,500 meters) and a 3-mile bicycle ride. On the other hand, the town also instituted some stuff like jousting that strangely didn’t make it into the official version.

The Olympic Games – for over 120 years, they have served as a showcase of supreme sporting skill and athleticism. They have also seen their fair share of controversy, mainly in the form of doping scandals, and even tragedy. The 1972 games in Munich spring to mind. At the same time, they’ve also been home to plenty of bizarre and unexpected occurrences. Today we take a look at ten of them.

10. Foiled by Fancy Footwear

The early Olympics had all sorts of events that aren’t around anymore, including tug-of-war. At the 1908 Games in London, three of the teams were from Great Britain, and all three consisted solely of members of police forces – one from Liverpool, one from the Met, and one from the City of London. Add to them two national teams from the U.S. and Sweden and you had the entire field for the tug-of-war event.

The Americans took on Liverpool in the quarterfinals and they lost almost immediately. Afterward, they complained to the officials that their opponents were using illegal footwear, described as being “as big as North River ferryboats, with steel-topped heels and steel cleats in the front of the soles, while spikes an inch long stuck out of the soles.”

This certainly sounded like it was against the rules since “prepared boots or shoes with any protruding nails” were banned, but the Liverpool police force insisted that the boots were standard issue that they wore on the job. Because of this, the American protest was dismissed, and the Liverpool team ended up taking the silver medal.

9. The Motorist & The Marathon

Unfortunately, cheating has always been a persistent problem at the Olympics. But while modern cheaters usually try to find new drugs that would fool the tests, at least in the past athletes were a bit more creative with their chicanery.

Take, for example, American long-distance runner Fred Lorz, who competed in the 1904 Olympic marathon in St. Louis. About halfway through the race, Lorz started cramping so his manager picked him up in his car and drove him for the next 11 miles. At the very least, you have to give Lorz credit for his absolute audacity. He wasn’t even trying to hide his deception, as he kept waving at fans while driving towards the finish line.

Lorz won the race, of course, and Alice Roosevelt, daughter of Teddy Roosevelt, was just about to place the gold medal around his neck when word of his fraud reached her. Lorz admitted to the deed and claimed that it was all just a joke and he had no intention of accepting the honor. Whether or not this was true we’ll never know, but Lorz did enjoy a redemption story the following year when he competed in the Boston Marathon. He won fair & square this time.

8. Twin Magic

Speaking of creative ways of sidestepping the rules, we have to tip our hats to Madeline de Jesús, who found a unique way to cheat the system when she represented Puerto Rico at the 1984 Summer Olympics in Los Angeles. But to be fair, Madeline did have an unfair advantage – a twin sister.

Now we know what you’re all thinking…and you’re exactly right. Madeline and Margaret did the ol’ switcheroo and hoped that nobody would be able to tell the difference. Here’s what happened: Madeline pulled her hamstring during the long jump competition and, less than a week later, she was due to take part in the 4×400 relay race to qualify for the finals. Normally, this would have meant that the team had to forfeit, but what if Margaret would take part in her place? After all, she was a track and field athlete, as well.

Madeline gave her all of her credentials and, for a few days, Margaret lived and trained at the Olympic village while successfully posing as her sister. Then, when the big day came, the Puerto Rican team qualified for the finals. At first, it seemed like the sisters managed to fool the world, and they might have gotten away with it, if not for one eagle-eyed journalist from Puerto Rico who unmasked the entire plot. He was able to tell the difference between Madeline and Margaret based on a beauty mark on a cheek. 

7. Duck Scullery

Bobby Pearce was an Australian rower who won the gold medal in the single sculls event consecutively at the 1928 and 1932 summer Olympics, the first to do so. However, his incredible feat of athleticism is not what has defined his Olympic career, but rather an act of kindness and compassion.

During the 1928 games in Amsterdam, Pearce had a sizable lead in the quarter-final race. Being alone in the boat, he could not see what was going on in front of him. At one point, he started hearing shouts and cries coming from the people on the banks. As he turned around to see what was going on, he saw a mother duck and a procession of tiny, fluffy ducklings crossing the canal right in his path. 

Many other athletes would have plowed right through them, unwilling to let some birds stop them from achieving sporting glory. Bobby Pearce, however, brought his boat to a halt and waited for the ducks to safely cross the canal before resuming his race. His compassion cost him the lead, with the French rower Vincent Saurin gaining five lengths on him. But karma was on his side that day and in an amazing display of skill and athleticism, Pearce not only caught up to the Frenchman but left him in the dust, winning the race with an almost 30-second lead.

6. Cuba’s First Olympian

We are returning to the 1904 Olympic Marathon in St. Louis to bring you the unbelievable story of Félix “Andarín” Carvajal, Cuba’s first Olympian. A postman back in his native Havana, Carvajal allegedly convinced the mayor to send him to the Olympics by running laps around City Hall for an entire workday. On his way to America, the athlete ran out of money in New Orleans. Some say Carvajal may have been robbed, but most sources believe that the postman gambled away the money he had for the trip.

He was now left penniless, 670 miles away from where the marathon was being held. With no other options, Carvajal walked and hitchhiked to St. Louis. He arrived in time, but he was dirty, sweaty, starving, and dog-tired from this trek…and he still had a marathon to run.

He didn’t have any racing gear, of course. Carvajal showed up wearing a dirty white shirt, long trousers, and work boots. Someone helped him by cutting his trousers and turning them into shorts, which only made his appearance even more bizarre and comical.

During the race, Carvajal quickly became a fan favorite, as he liked to stop and chat with the people in attendance. At one point, he ran past an apple orchard, and, remembering that he hadn’t eaten in two days, he popped inside for a quick mid-race snack. Unfortunately, the apples were rotten, and this gave him a serious stomach ache, so Carvajal also stopped for a quick mid-race nap. He still came in fourth place.

5. Where Is Ali’s Medal?

At the 1960 Summer Olympics in Rome, an 18-year-old Muhammad Ali won the gold medal for light heavyweight boxing. Thirty-six years later, at the Atlanta games, he received a replacement medal because he had lost the first one. What happened during that time to Ali’s original gold medal remains a mystery to this day.

According to Ali’s autobiography, published in 1975, he threw it in the Ohio River in Louisville, in an act of anger and defiance, after getting into a fight for being refused service at a “whites-only” restaurant. This story turned out to be apocryphal, according to several of the boxer’s friends, but, so far, nobody has offered a different explanation, so there is a chance that someone, somewhere has Muhammad Ali’s gold medal.

4. The Most Boring Race in History

If something is boring, then it obviously doesn’t make for a very good story. But if something is the most boring, then it automatically becomes interesting. That’s what we are dealing with today – what has to be the most anticlimactic race in Olympics history: the 18-foot dinghy sailing event at the 1920 Summer Games.  

What made this affair so lackluster? It’s simple: only one team took part – the team of Francis Richards and Thomas Hedberg from Great Britain. And if that’s not bad enough, they didn’t even finish the first race. They didn’t compete in the other three races but, since they were the only ones in the competition, they still received points.

It remains a bit of an Olympic mystery if the pair were actually declared winners and medaled at the end of the event, or if the whole thing was scrapped. Some official records make no mention of the 18-foot race even being staged, while others list the two sailors as gold medal winners.

3. Stealing the First Flag

The Olympic flag, with the five interlacing rings of different colors, has become one of the most recognizable symbols in the world. It was designed by the father of the modern Olympics himself, Pierre de Coubertin, and officially adopted at the 1920 Summer games in Antwerp. However, it didn’t last very long. At the end of the games, the original flag went missing, and the Olympics committee had to create a replacement for the next games in Paris.

The fate of the first flag became a mystery, one that lasted for almost eight decades. Fast forward to 1997 at a U.S. Olympic Committee dinner and a journalist brought up the fact that the original flag had never been found. This prompted a former Olympian named Hal Haig Prieste to approach the journalist and casually bring up the fact that he had the missing flag and that he had kept it in a suitcase for the last 80 years.  

A hundred years old at the time of the dinner, Prieste had competed at the 1920 games as a diver and took home the bronze. Following a night of enthusiastic celebrations, he was dared by a teammate to climb up the flagpole and steal the flag…which he did, and he absconded from Belgium with the flag safely tucked away in his suitcase. It wasn’t until the dinner 80 years later that he realized the importance of his souvenir, so in 2000 a ceremony was organized for the flag to finally be returned to the Olympics committee.   

2. The Case of the Mystery Cox

You might ask yourself who the youngest gold medalist in Olympics history is. That’s a perfectly valid question and certainly a great claim to fame. The answer, however, is not completely straightforward. Officially, diver Marjorie Gestring is recognized as the youngest, at 13 years and 267 days. However, we know for certain that there was someone younger than her. We just have no idea who he was.

This goes all the way back to the 1900 Summer Games in Paris, at the coxed pair rowing event. Each team consisted of three people – two rowers and a cox to guide them. Since the cox didn’t do any kind of physical labor, it was beneficial for the team for him to be as light as possible. Consequently, one of the French teams decided to use a young boy as their cox and the Dutch team decided to emulate them. Before the race, they replaced their regular cox, Hermanus Brockmann, with some random boy they plucked from the crowd, around 7-to-10 years old. And the Dutch team won first place, making that boy the youngest gold medalist in history. He took a photo with the winning team before disappearing into the crowd, never to be seen again, and nobody even knows his name.

1. The Olympic Torch Relay

There are many symbols and traditions associated with the Olympics – the rings, the flag, the mascots. And, of course, who could forget the torch relay? Starting every time from Olympia, in Greece, the torch is carried from city to city, until it reaches the host city where it is used to light the Olympic flame and mark the official start of the games. It is a grand tradition that encapsulates the pageantry and universal appeal of the Olympics. It’s just a shame that it was created by Nazi Germany.

Yes, that’s right. The Olympic torch relay was first used at the 1936 games in Berlin. You might think that it sounds like the kind of thing done in ancient times, but that’s exactly what Germany was looking for – something that created a symbolic link between the modern Nazis and the ancient Greeks. 

The man usually credited with inventing the torch relay was Carl Diem, one of the main organizers of the 1936 games. He wasn’t a Nazi himself, but once Hitler and Goebbels realized the propaganda potential of the Olympics, they co-opted the entire event and ensured that every single detail was used to show the superiority of the Third Reich.