Olympic Games

D

1960s and 1970s

In the 1960s African runners such as Wilson Kiprugut of Kenya and Abebe Bikila of Ethiopia achieved Olympic prominence, while athletes from Eastern Europe dominated gymnastics and weightlifting events. Each of the three successive Olympics held in the 1960s—1960 (Rome), 1964 (Tokyo), and 1968 (Mexico City)—produced a boxing gold medalist from the United States who later went on to win the professional heavyweight title: Cassius Clay (who would change his name to Muhammad Ali), Joe Frazier, and George Foreman. At the Mexico City games the United States led the total medal standings for the first time since 1952, and East and West Germans participated on separate teams for the first time.

At the 1972 Games in Munich, West Germany, American swimmer Mark Spitz set a remarkable record with 7 gold medals. Although Soviet athlete Ludmilla Tourischeva won the all-around gymnastics title in Munich, another Soviet, Olga Korbut, garnered the most attention. She won three gold medals, and her popularity helped start a period of international growth in gymnastics. But the 1972 Games were overshadowed by a horrible act of violence when 11 members of the Israeli team were killed by Palestinian terrorists (see Political Turmoil section).

Four years later, at the Montréal Games, Nadia Comaneci of Romania won the women’s all-around gymnastics title, and in the uneven-bars event she earned the first perfect score of 10.0 in Olympic gymnastics competition. American runner Bruce Jenner won the decathlon and became one of the decade’s best-known athletes. Perhaps the most outstanding performance at the 1976 Games came from the East German women’s swimming team, which won 11 of 13 races. With a population of only about 16 million people, East Germany won 40 gold medals in Montréal, six more than the United States. These surprising results were tainted decades later, however, when records were released documenting widespread use of performance-enhancing drugs by the East Germans during the 1970s and 1980s.

E

1980s and 1990s

Because the 1980 Games in Moscow and the 1984 Games in Los Angeles were affected by large boycotts, the team from the host nation was able to claim an unprecedented triumph in both cases. In 1980, when 62 nations boycotted the first Games ever held in a Communist country, the Soviet team earned 80 gold medals, 69 silver medals, and 46 bronze medals. Comaneci won four more gymnastics medals and Cuban boxer Teófilo Stevenson captured his third consecutive gold medal in the heavyweight division. The running events featured three gold medals by British athletes (including Sebastian Coe who won a silver in the 800 meters and a gold in the 1,500 meters), and two golds for Ethiopia’s Miruts Yifter (5,000 meters and 10,000 meters).

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In 1984, as the USSR and 13 other countries (including East Germany, Cuba, and Czechoslovakia) boycotted the Games, the American team claimed 83 gold medals, 61 silver medals, and 30 bronze medals. American sprinter Carl Lewis, who won four events (100-meter, 200-meter, 4 × 100-meter relay, and long jump), emerged as the greatest track-and-field athlete of his time. American Mary Lou Retton won the women’s all-around gymnastics title and five medals overall. U.S. swimmers Nancy Hogshead, Mary T. Meagher, and Tracy Caulkins each won three gold medals.

At the 1988 Games in Seoul, South Korea, Lewis repeated his victory in the long jump and was awarded a belated gold in the 100-meter race after the apparent victor, Canadian Ben Johnson, was disqualified for having taken banned drugs. East German swimmers, led by Kristin Otto, won 10 of the 15 events for women in 1988 while American swimmer Matt Biondi won five gold medals. Equally impressive were American track-and-field athletes Florence Griffith Joyner, who won the 100-meter and 200-meter races and was a member of the winning 4 × 100-meter relay team, and Jackie Joyner-Kersee, who won the long jump event and the heptathlon.

At the 1992 Games in Barcelona, Spain, no single nation dominated competition. With the USSR dissolved, member nations of the former Soviet bloc competed together for the final time under the banner of the Unified Team. Gymnast Vitaly Scherbo of the Unified Team led all athletes in Barcelona with six gold medals, with the Unified Team edging the United States in the medal standings, 112 to 108.

The 1992 Games also marked further relaxation of rules regarding amateur athletes in the Olympics. The most visible symbol of this change was the United States men’s Olympic basketball team, which featured top professional players for the first time. Members of the squad, known as the Dream Team, included NBA stars such as Michael Jordan, Larry Bird, Charles Barkley, and Magic Johnson. The team completely dominated the competition on its way to the gold medal.

In 1996 the centennial anniversary of the modern Olympic Games was celebrated in Atlanta, Georgia. The Games featured several outstanding performances: In diving, Fu Mingxia of China captured gold medals in women’s 3-meter springboard and 10-meter platform competition; in track and field, American Michael Johnson won gold medals in the 200-meter and 400-meter dashes; and in track, Canadian Donovan Bailey triumphed in the 100-meter dash. The Games were marred, however, by a terrorist attack in Atlanta’s Centennial Olympic Park. A pipe bomb, which detonated early in the morning of July 27, left one person dead and more than 100 wounded. Olympic competition continued without another violent incident.

F

The 2000 and 2004 Games

No such terrorist events occurred at the 2000 Summer Games, held in Sydney, Australia. Stars of the Games included Australian swimmer Ian Thorpe, who won three gold medals along with two silver medals; American sprinter Marion Jones, who earned three golds and two bronzes; female swimmers Inge de Bruijn of The Netherlands and Jenny Thompson of the United States, each of whom won three gold medals; Michael Johnson, who became the first man to win consecutive Olympic gold medals in the 400-meter dash; and American tennis player Venus Williams, who won the women’s singles gold medal and teamed with sister Serena Williams to capture the gold in doubles. The United States finished first in the medals standings, besting Russia, 97 to 88.

The Summer Olympics made a historic return to Greece for the 2004 Games. Preparations in Athens were plagued by delays and security concerns and attendance was low at many events. There were also continued problems with athletes suspected of using performance-enhancing drugs, including a number of U.S. track-and-field competitors. Two prominent Greek athletes withdrew just before the Games under suspicious circumstances, and several other competitors were stripped of their medals in Athens for failing or avoiding drug tests.

The United States led the medal standings with 103 total medals, including 35 gold. Russia was second with 92 medals while China, which will host the 2008 Summer Olympics, was third with 63 total medals (including 32 gold). One of the highlights of the Games was the performance of U.S. swimmer Michael Phelps, who tied a record (set in 1980 by USSR gymnast Aleksandr Dityatin) with eight medals in one Olympics (six gold and two bronze). The United States also dominated women’s team sports, winning gold medals in soccer, softball, and basketball.

VIII

Winter Olympics

A

The First Winter Games

Although figure skating was an event at the Summer Games of 1908 and 1920, and ice hockey was played in 1920, the IOC was hesitant to inaugurate a series of separate Winter Games. The weather requirements for such a competition meant that possible locations for the Games would be geographically limited. When Sweden and Norway first proposed the creation of Winter Games in 1911, the United States opposed it on these grounds. Ironically, the Scandinavians changed their minds at the 1921 meeting of the IOC, arguing that an Olympics with winter sports would not unite athletes from every country. They were outvoted, however, and the IOC established the Winter Games.

The Winter Olympic Games were first held as a separate competition in 1924 at Chamonix-Mont-Blanc, France. From that time until 1992, they took place the same year as the Summer Games. However, beginning with the 1994 Winter Olympics in Lillehammer, Norway, the Winter Games were rescheduled to occur in the middle of the Olympic cycle, alternating on even-numbered years with the Summer Games. The 1924 Winter Games included 14 events in five different sports. By comparison, the program for the 2002 Winter Games, held in Salt Lake City, Utah, included more than 75 events in 15 different sports.

In the first Winter Olympics the Scandinavian countries dominated competition. Norwegian athletes won all four of the skiing events, while Finnish competitors finished first in four of the five speed-skating events. The Winter Games first gained wide international notice four years later at Saint Moritz, Switzerland, when Norwegian skater Sonja Henie won the first of her three consecutive Olympic skating titles. Her triumphs in 1932 and 1936, in addition to her charisma, contributed to her subsequent success as a motion-picture star.

B

1940s Through 1960s

The Winter Games were cancelled in 1940 and 1944 because of World War II. (They were to have been held in Sapporo, Japan, and Cortina d’Ampezzo, Italy, respectively.) At the first postwar Winter Games in 1948, held again in Saint Moritz, Canadian Barbara Ann Scott won the gold medal in women’s figure skating, while American Dick Button won the men’s event. The Canadian team won the gold in ice hockey, and American Gretchen Fraser won a gold in women’s downhill skiing (in the slalom event).

At the 1952 Games in Oslo, Norway, Button repeated his victory and the Canadians again won the ice hockey gold medal. American skaters continued their success in figure skating at the 1956 Games in Cortina d’Ampezzo, with Hayes Jenkins winning the men’s event and Tenley Albright becoming the first American to win the women’s event. Austrian downhill skier Toni Sailer won all three of the men’s skiing events (downhill, slalom, and giant slalom). David Jenkins, the younger brother of Hayes Jenkins, repeated the American victory in men’s figure skating at the 1960 Games in Squaw Valley, California, while another American, Carol Heiss, captured the gold in the women’s event.

The 1964 Winter Games were held in Innsbruck, Austria. Swedish cross-country skier Sixten Jernberg won the last of his nine Olympic medals, with golds in the 50-kilometer individual race and the 4 × 10-kilometer team race and a bronze in the 15-kilometer race, and Soviets Liudmila Belousova and Oleg Protopopov won the pairs figure skating competition. The pair repeated their victory at the 1968 Games in Grenoble, France, where American figure skater Peggy Fleming won the gold in the women’s event. The 1968 Games were also notable for the accomplishments of French downhill skier Jean-Claude Killy, who repeated Sailer’s feat by winning all three of the men’s events.

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