Fun Facts about the Olympics

1. Fun Facts about the
Olympics
BY MARK MIKAIL

2.  The Olympic gold medals haven't been made out of solid
gold since 1912. They must, however, be plated with six
grams of gold.
 Ethiopian runner Abebe Bikila was the first black athlete to
win gold in the marathon, when he outran everyone in the
1960 Olympics...with no shoes on.
 The first modern Olympics in 1896 didn't even have gold
medals. The top spot got a silver medal and an olive branch,
in reference to the original Greek games. Second place got a
bronze medal, and third place got absolutely nothing.

3.  The 1900 Olympics featured a competitor who is still
unknown to this day, and may be the youngest ever. The
Dutch rowing team was lacking a coxswain, so they chose a
local French boy to fill in. To this day, no one knows the
boy's identity, and many estimate him to have been around
10 years old.
 The Olympic flag represents every country in the world. The
rings are meant to represent the five continents (they count
America, Asia, Africa, Europe, and Oceania). As for the colors,
every single flag of every country in the world contains at
least one of those colors: yellow, green, red, black, and blue.

4.  The longest wrestling match in the history of the games
took more than 11 hours. It was the Greco-Roman wrestling
semifinal in 1912, between Martin Klein of Russia and
Alfred Asikainen of Finland. Klein won, but couldn't even
compete in the final as he was too exhausted from the 11-
hour match.
 For the 1900 Olympics, held in Paris, winners were given
paintings instead of medals, which the French believed
were far more valuable.