The Trials and Tribulations of 1904 Olympic Marathon Runners

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In this video:

When the United States hosted the Olympics for the first time in 1904, the games had yet to reach the high level of competition and popularity we know today. Although athletes from countries around the world were invited to participate, the games were less about the world’s best athletes competing for medals and more about (actual) amateur athletes competing against each other.

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[TodayIFoundOut]

Keep your mind racing by watching this video about The First Woman To Officially Run in the Boston Marathon:

[namsake]

I find it amazing that these guys could just walk into an Olympic Event without an approving committee. Just picture a guy walking up to the starting line, the gun fires, and he runs. Then, at the end, that's when they ask him which country he's from... like they are just having a schoolyard race or something.

[bmerio]

How is this not a movie? This is hilarious.

[ZombieX]

Hicks did pretty damn good considering he was being poisoned and purposefully dehydrated.

[treetopy]

CHASED OFF THE COURSE BY A WILD DOG. That's some OG Olympics for you.

[petergray]

Bonus fact for this episode: The Brazilian team funded their trip to the 1932 Summer Olympics in Los Angeles by sailing there on a ship loaded with coffee. The ship pulled into ports in along its route, sold as much coffee as there was demand. However the team barely broke even by doing this, and when the ship at the Port of Los Angeles, they had only enough money to pay the disembarkation fee for halfl of the team (fee= $1). The ship proceeded to San Francisco, where enough money was raised for more team members to join their mates in LA, but despite this only sixty seven of the eighty two team members could disembark to compete.

[kirbymarchbarcena]

That was probably the strangest marathon ever occurred.

[iatsd]

And in the swimming races, the Australian team complained about their loss following several of their swimmers hitting ducks that were resident on the then-newly installed "pool" - you can see it today in front of the At Louis Art Museum. It still has ducks.

[flyingcabbage]

John Bois video on this is amazing, genuinely one of the best YouTube videos I've ever seen

[Xerdoz]

Why isn't there a movie about this race?

[micahphilson]

That was a bit of a twist at first.
"These are all these facts about one of the most brutal marathons ever!"
"Bonus fact: In the 1500s, many catholic countries and Scotland adopted the Gregorian calendar!"

[wheelslifts]

This was one of the best stories I ever heard. I heard it first from qxir's tales from the bottle video on it. It was hilarious! You forgot the runner who lacked proper identification to run for his team.. france I think? And they let him run for the us lol.

[asentientroomba]

Jon Bois at SB Nation did a really interesting video about this topic that's really worth checking out. It's called RAT POISON AND BRANDY: THE 1904 ST. LOUIS OLYMPIC MARATHON. Very in depth, funny, and worth watching

[HandeToon]

7:23 Don't you mean it was the slowest time in which a marathon was won? I assume the people who finished after him had to have slower times.

[snowfloofcathug]

Citation Needed: Thomas Trueblood and the Ridiculous Marathon is conveniently and unsurprisingly the top recommendation :P xD

[nuagor]

When you lose focus for a moment, and he's talking about calendars??

[peregrination]

What a bummer to miss the Olympics by two weeks because of calendar difference and the lack of acknowledging that the Olympics was scheduled using the other calendar.

[DuluthTW]

This was hilarious. Thanks for sharing!

[user]

Congratulations on reaching 1, 000, 000 Subscribers.

I did my bit long ago by hitting the subscribe button.

[puppetguy]

When Sweden switched over to the Gregorian calendar some people were upset that "His Majesty has stolen 11 days from us"