From the wikipedia:
While Frederick Lorz was greeted as the apparent winner, he was later disqualified as he had hitched a ride in a car for part of the race.
Seriously go read the wiki, this post barely scratches the surface of the nonsense that went down
From then until the end of the race, Hicks received several doses of strychnine – a common rat poison, which stimulates the nervous system in small doses – mixed with brandy and egg white.[3] This was the earliest recorded use of performance-enhancing drugs in the revived Olympic Games.[6] He continued to battle onwards, hallucinating, and was barely able to walk for most of the course. When he reached the stadium, his support team carried him over the line, holding him in the air while he shuffled his feet as if still running.[6] Hicks had to be carried off the track on a stretcher, and might have died in the stadium had he not been treated by four doctors. He lost 8 pounds (3.6 kg) during the course of the marathon.[6]
That was back when Olympians were Olympians, not the finely tuned, pampered sports professionals we see today! /s
Boomers describing their way to school:
Of fucking course it was in St Louis, Missouri.
Jon Bois, an excellent and hilarious video essayist, did a video on this! Really good, and I recommend watching anything and everything Jon Bois makes.
I think there is a pretty good episode of the Dollop on it too.
Didn’t the original Marathon runner, Pheidippides, die of exhaustion soon after? Maybe the organizers were trying to recreate history as understood in their time.
Yeah but he ran like 130 miles, then fought in a battle, and then sprinted another 26 miles.
Which is wild cuz they definitely had horses, and it’s a story from the 1800s
I would watch the shit out of this as a movie. Why isn’t this a movie?
It would be a fantastic comedy film, but could be seen as too far-fetched.
“Based on a true story”
All you need
I mean I guess…
I just watched Coyote v Acme the other night, and that movie starts with “based on a true story.” I can assure you that it was not.
Turns out that title card does not need to actually be true
Technically, Game of Thrones is based on a true story, since it was based on the 100 Years War.
It doesn’t mean “non-fiction.” It just means the idea was based on something non-fiction.
not movie length but still quite good:
Mostly TrueLooks like the srychnine was intended as a performance enhancing drug, but Hicks was carried over the finish line by his team, so he should have by rights been disqualified.
Some pretty crazy shit, all in all.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Athletics_at_the_1904_Summer_Olympics_–_Men's_marathon
Not having eaten in 40 hours, he saw a spectator eating two peaches. He asked if he could have the peaches, and the spectator declined. He then stole both peaches and ran away.
Lol
the strychnine was intended as a performance enchancer
???
Based solely on the adage of “what doesn’t kill you makes you stronger”.
that wikipedia article is a work of art
That fucking wild!
I’m not a doctor, but I don’t think that’s how stomach lining works. Or else, people working in very dusty environments 40 h/week would constantly get stomach issues.
Maybe he was so hungry he ate the dust
So Canada, Mexico, and US competed as North America back then?
There’s a joke about the rat race in there somewhere
Asian Games 2026 in Japan will be the modern example
https://mainichi.jp/english/articles/20260924/p2a/00m/0na/017000c
“We are sorry for your inconveniences, the competent people are all being trailed for corruption” 🍒
Aichi-Nagoya Asian Games organizers apologize for wrong anthem
Kuwait played the Borat anthem when a Kazakhstani shooter won an international competition there.
Also, I believe the guy who finished first was disqualified for riding in a car for part of the race. I could be misremembering though.
Correct he was riding with the car for nearly half the race, assuming Wikipedia is correct. I strongly recommend to read the Wikipedia article about this race, but this meme is a good summary of it.
They should add this alongside the regular marathon. Call cmarathon: Chaos mode
So do they spin a big wheel-of-fortune type thing to see who gets the rat poison, or do they give every competitor a cocktail of weird stuff, one of which also contains the poison?
Or when Rachael Gunn failed to receive a single score on her dance.
