From Greece to Japan: History of the Olympic Games
Since the beginning of times, people all around the world have competed with each other in many different ways: who is faster, who is stronger, or who is braver. So it was just a matter of time to come up with a competition that would solve the problem of figuring out who is the best.
HOW IT ALL BEGAN?

About 3 000 years ago, a small village named Olympia started the 1st registered Olympic Games in history. For a long time, there was only one day in 4 years when people from Olympia competed in running. Yes, running was the 1st kind of sport at the Olympics!
Year by year, the Olympic games were growing bigger - more kinds of sports, more days and more people from all over Greece. Spear throwing, wrestling, and jumping - many classical sports we can see nowadays in the Modern Olympic Games.
Ancient Olympics interesting facts:
- The 1st Olympic games were only among male Greeks. Live viewers of the 1st Olympic games could be only men.
- Pankration was the most hardcore competition. It was a mix of wrestling and boxing with no rules!
- Athletes competed naked! They did such things to show their power and strength to Zeus.
- Instead of gold, silver, and bronze medals, the only prize was a wreath made of olive leaves.
- One of the 1st hotels in history was built for the Olympic games. It was named as its founder - Leonidas!
The Olympic games were stopped for a long time at the end of the fourth century (due to some religious grounds) and came back only in 1896. So it was the first International Olympic games with amateur participants from 12 countries.
TOKYO OLYMPICS
Today there will be more than 50 sports at the Tokyo Olympics, and 205 countries will participate! The Olympics became a place where the best sportsmen can compete with each other not only for prizes but for immortal glory and new world records!
Here are the most incredible unbeaten records of the Olympic games: