Olympic Games are the global multidisciplinary sport competition events involving athletes in ancient Greece who were dedicated to the god Zeus. There are three types of Olympic Games: the Summer Olympics, the Winter Olympics, and the Youth Olympic games that first took place from August 14 to 26, 2010. The first two are made with an interval, two years since 1992. The organization responsible for carrying them out is the International Olympic Committee (by abbreviation IOC).The current Olympic Games were inspired by the events organized by the ancient Greeks in the city of Olympia, between 776 BC. 393 n.e. In the nineteenth century, the idea of performing events similar to those organized in Antiquity arose, which would be realized mainly thanks to the efforts of the French nobleman Pierre Fr.dy, Baron de Coubertin. The first edition of the so-called Olympic Games of the Modern Era was held in Athens, capital of Greece at the 1896 Summer Olympics in Athens. Since that time, the Summer Olympics have been held every four years in various parts of the planet, the only exceptions being 1916, 1940 and 1944 editions, due to the outbreak of World War I and II.
The Olympic symbol consists of five rings representing the five continents of the world: Africa, America (North and South), Asia, Europe, and Oceania. They are intertwined to symbolize the sporting friendship of all peoples.
The Winter Olympics were first held in 1924, in the French town of Chamonix. Formerly held as part of the summer event, the IOC considered them to be a separate event retroactively, and from that date, they began to be held in the same year as the original Games. Subsequently, to enhance the development of winter events, the IOC decided to disregard the holding of the Winter Olympics from Lillehammer 1994. Since then, the Winter Olympics are held in even years between two Summer Games.
In 2007, the IOC thanks to the idea of its president, the Belgian Jacques Rogge, decided to incorporate a new type of event: the Youth Olympic Games, which will begin to be held from 2010 and 2012 in its summer editions and winter, respectively.
The latest edition of the Olympic Games took place in the city of London, capital of the United Kingdom, between July and August 2012, the next edition will take place in Rio de Janeiro in 2016 while the Winter Olympics will be held in the Russian city of Sochi in 2014.
The Games in the Ancient Age
In ancient Greece, the most prestigious military, literate, intellectuals or sculptors spent the dusk cultivating their muscles in those gyms, which in fact by their composition had a claslist character, because it only admitted to pure citizens, it is said, the Jonios, in Athens,and the Dorios, in Sparta,for example. Not even the so-called middle class, Periecos or Metecos, did not have access to these facilities.
Somehow it must have influenced the conditions of war between cities as well, given that the Games stopped confrontations. In the same sense, the incidence of the physical attributes that were tanned, both because of the importance of physical culture and in the very heat of battles, could not be ruled out.
But the truth is that the Greeks came to a Games, which at the time reached a high rigor, because, in their regulations of 12 sections, it is collected up to the requirement of a certificate of 10 months of previous training, something like what would today be a requirement of classification minimum mark to access the final.
The name Olympians is due to the one that the Games were held at the Shrine of Olympia, in the Peloponnese, in honor of Zeus, and began with a ceremony and a sacrifice to that deity. The first edition consisted only of a race of 185 or 190 meters (a length of the athletics track) by 32 wide and the winner was Coraebo de I’d. Later, longer races, wrestling, and pentathlon were added, which included discand javelin throws, cross-country races, long jump, and wrestling. Boxing, chariot racing, the form of violent wrestling known as pancracy, and other sports were added.
The conquest of Greece by the Romans in the second century before our era brought a gradual flogging of the Games, for the Romans, although they began giving the Games also a religious character, gradually lost it, by exaltation above those of the Emperor’s person. In the same way, they also lost in rigor until they deteriorated by turning competition scenarios into death camps.
Already with an unsustainable situation, which also touched the mighty Empire, in 393, Emperor Theodose abolished the Olympic Games.
The Games in the Modern Age
It took 1 503 for humanity to receive the Olympics again. Thanks to the work and tenacity of the Frenchman Pierre de Coubertin, the excellent moment of glory reigned again in the stadiums.
Baron Pierre de Coubertin, promoter of the Olympic Games of the Modern Age
The restoration of the Olympic Games in line with the demands of contemporary life will bring together representatives of all the nations of the world every four years, and we believe that this peaceful and ethical struggle will create the best internationalism
Pierre de Coubertin
Coubertin’s Olympic philosophy is based on a thorough study of the Greek world and mostly in which he realizes that sport could become an essential element in the formation of man. Of course, moreover, from his passion for the Hellenic world, Pierre de Fredi (name of Pila), he receives a great influence from several thinkers, especially the Englishman Thomas Arnold, considered by many scholars as to the father of Modern Physical Culture.
A professor at the prestigious French University of Sorbonne, Coubertin, develops his idea of the restoration of the Olympic Games and in that same scenario, receives the first criticisms.
He then arrived on April 10, 1894, and the Frenchman manages to create the International Olympic Committee, with only 13 members, Australia, Bohemia, Great Britain, Hungary, France, Russia, Greece, Belgium, Spain, United States, Netherlands, Italy, and Sweden. Several definitions have since been reached since then: suspension, disqualification, qualification, and others.
That first International Olympic Committee was chaired by the Greek Demetrius Vikelas, leaving Uberinas as Secretary-General. The governing body established for April 6, 1896, the first edition of the Olympic Games of the Modern Age. At the Panathinaiko Stadium where around 80,000 people attended the opening of the world sporting festival, King George I of Greece held the official opening by expressing:
“”I proclaim the opening of the first International Olympic Games in Athens. Long live the Nation. Long live the Greek people.””
American discus pitcher Robert Garret, the first modern Olympic champion in discus throwing and weight throwing.
American John Conolly opened the gold medal locker for these dates by stretching to 13 meters and 71 centimeters in the triple jump competition. A total of 245 athletes, all men, as the Hellenic heritage of Coubertín, also included the exclusion of women from the Games, participated in the leaders of nine disciplines: athletics, Greco-Roman wrestling, weights, shooting, fencing, tennis, swimming, artistic gymnastics, and cycling. The Pericles Stadium, built for the occasion, was the main host of the sporting festival.
There were 14 nations that responded to this first call. Germany, Australia, Bulgaria, Chile, Denmark, the United States, France, Great Britain, Greece, Hungary, Sweden, and Switzerland are the founding pavilions of the Games.
While the American Robert Garret, left stunned and frustrated the Greeks by his triumph in the release of the album, pioneering test of the Ancient Olympics, and in which Garret was the only foreign contestant, the hosts if they were overwhelmed with joy when Spridiom Louis built a bridge with his ancestors when he was crowned champion of the marathon race, a modality that Coubertín includes in the Games as a tribute to Greece and in honor of the warrior Filípides who traveled 40 kilometers to convey the news of the battle of the marathon and indicate that the Persians had invaded. The United States mostly in swimming, France in cycling, and Germany in gymnastics.
Types of Olympic Games
There are currently three types of Olympic Games: the Summer Olympics held every four years, the Winter Olympics, those held at a two-year interval, and the Youth Olympics, which were approved by the International Olympic Committee, and the first edition was held in 2010 in Singapore.
In the twentieth century, the Olympic Games were interrupted by two World Wars, affecting the appointments of Berlin in 1916, Tokyo in 1940, and London in1944, but the Olympics they had arrived to stay, and since Britain celebrated them in 1948, the cycle has not been interrupted.