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According to tradition, when the Greek army defeated the Persians at Marathon in 490 bc, the runner Pheidippides was dispatched to bring the good news to Athens (in fact there is no contemporary evidence for the story, which is not recorded until 700 years after the event). When the modern Olympic Games were first held, in Athens in 1896, a long-distance race was introduced to commemorate the ancient feat, run over a course supposedly equal in distance to the journey from Marathon to Athens (about 35 km/22 mi). The present distance was established at the 1948 Olympics in London, England.
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