Field Notes

Olympic Watch 2004

Back to the Future

Ancient Stadium at Olympia to Host Shot-Put

Late last year the organizers of the 2004 Summer Olympic Games, to be held in Athens, decided to stage men’s and women’s shot-put events in the fourth-century B.C. stadium at Olympia, where the first Olympiad was held in 776 B.C.

In the earliest games, naked male runners competed in a single 200-yard-dash known as the “stade” (hence our word “stadium”). Over the following millennium, the list of competitions expanded to include horse races, chariot races, boxing, the pentathlon (discus, javelin, jumping, running and wrestling) and other events.

The Olympia stadium, a UNESCO world-heritage monument located about 200 miles west of Athens in the Peloponnesus, originally accommodated more than 40,000 people. Modern officials will permit only 15,000 tickets to be sold, however, to minimize disturbance of the archaeological site.

Additional safeguards are in place: Spectators will have to stand on an embankment (no modern seating will be installed) and may have to squint to see some of the action. And the awards ceremony, held several days after the events, will be moved to Athens to accommodate a larger crowd.