Read on Twitter
Read a very interesting story about the marathon held at 1904 Summer Olympics. Wonder how come no one has made a movie about it yet. (1/25)
32 runners participated in the race and only 14 finished! Of the 14, one finished race in a car.. one was carried over the line by 2 people and one came half asleep! (2/25)
This was the race track. (3/25)
On paper this looks good. But the track was just normal roads on which wagons and cars went by. These were mud roads filled with immense dust. (4/25)
In addition, the race officials rode in cars along with the runners, creating even more dust. (5/25)
One of the organizers wanted to conduct an experiment on how much humans dehydrate on purpose, and he allowed only one water stop - at the 11th mile. (6/25)
The race was held at Missouri, in August, peak summer with temperatures reaching as high as 33 degrees with almost 90% humidity. And runners had to run for 11 miles with no water to hydrate themselves! (7/25)
Along the track, after some 19miles, a bystander found an American runner, William Garcia, spitting blood and collapsing on the road. He suffered several internal injuries due to inhaling the dust on the road. Had not for that bystander, he would have died on the track! (8/25)
The race leader, Fred Lorz, was completely drained out around the 8th mile. He took a car and continued the race! At almost 19th mile, the car broke down and Fred had to start running again. He was the first to finish the race, quite obviously. (9/25)
"An American had won!", screamed the commentator. Fred even took a photograph with Alice Roosevelt, the daughter of US President Theodore Roosevelt. Just when he was about to receive the Gold medal, a witness claimed that Fred travelled in a car for almost 11 miles! (10/25)
Getting a Gold medal is always historic, but in 1904 it would have been colossally historic. Because 1904 Olympics was the first time Gold medals were introduced. Till then the person finishing first would walk with a silver medal only. (11/25)
"It was just a joke", Fred said after admitting. Officials didn't see the lighter side of things and banned Fred for a year. The next year, he won the Boston Marathon, this time by actually running. (12/25)
The second person to finish the race, and the winner of the Gold medal was another American runner, Thomas Hicks. Because water was not available, Hicks was fed with Rat poison - yeah you read that right - rat poison mixed with brandy to keep him energetic. (13/25)
This guy had several hallucinations and believed he still had to run 20miles more, when he had almost finished the race. Completely drained out, he was carried over the finish line by 2 other people! It took 4 doctors at the stadium to make him leave the stadium alive. (14/25)
The funniest story in this episode was the Cuban runner, Andarin Carvajal, who finished 4th in the race. After arriving to US, he gambled so hard that he lost all his money. He walked and hitchhiked from his place to the stadium and arrived just on time. (15/25)
With no money to buy sports wear, he came to race wearing his casual shirt and pant. Sympathising with his plight, one of the fellow runners, tore his pant upto his knees using a knife and converted that into running shorts. (16/25)
No money to buy wear also meant no money to buy food. He came to the Marathon race starving for 2 days straight! (17/25)
During the run, he stole pears and fruits from the people on road and kept eating. The track also passed through an orchard. Lucky for him! He plucked apples and ate during his run. (18/25)
Satan smiled at him as he ate an apple. It was rotten (or cursed?). This upset his stomach and he had to take a nap by the road for sometime to recover. (19/25)
Yes. The guy who finished 4th in 1904 Olympics Marathon actually slept during the run! (20/25)
The craziness doesn't end. Guys who finished 9th & 12th were South Africans - Len Tau & Jan Mashiani . In fact, they were the first Africans to participate in an Olympics event. Quite a historical feat but they wud be remembered, centuries later, for other funny reasons. (21/25)
They landed in US in 1904 for some exhibition and enrolled themselves in Marathon because it would be fun! And they got in! (22/25)
Len Tau finished 9th. But he could have finished in a much better position if not going off-track mid way. He was chased by a group of mad street dogs and he had to run for his life, drifting from the race path and running for more than a mile in the other direction! (23/25)
After the race, officials were almost determined to ban Marathon races, saying running a marathon was inhumane. "I am certain Marathon would not be a part of 1908", said one of the Olympic officials. (24/25)
It's so bizzare that we would have laughed at the writer if it were some fiction. Who would have thought such things to happen at the Olympics!Craziness on steroids! Or rather on Rat poison? (25/25)
By the way, this is how the first ever Gold medallist in Olympics Marathon finished the race.
Scores of races happened over centuries. But little did these people knew, that they would be part of a historic run.
(Pic courtesy: Wikimedia commons)
(Pic courtesy: Wikimedia commons)
