The
legend of Spiridon Louis
The great victory of Spiridon Louis in the marathon race of
the Athens Olympic Games (1896) contributed in the association
of his name with
the history of modern Greek sport.
He was born in early 1872 by a couple of peasants from Maroussi
in Attica. From an early age he was occupied in farming and
later he became water seller.
His participation in the marathon was adventurous, seeing
that his effort in the preliminaries had been unsuccessful.
More specifically, he ranked 17th, whereas according to the
programme of the games only 16 athletes could participate
in the final. Therefore his presence in the big race was ensured
after the insistence of the head of the organization of the
contest and starter, G. Papadiamantopoulos, who tried successfully
to have more participants in the final than what was initially
planned. The latter was a cavalry major and Louis had served
as his groom during his military service, where he had displayed
his resistance and speed and had resorted to them on many
occasions in order to be punctual in his military duties.
Several days before the marathon, that particular event monopolized
the interest of the Greek sports fans. When the big moment
finally arrived, everybody was wondering whether anyone of
the Greek athletes would be able to win in an event that was
inspired from the history of ancient Athens. No-one dared
to forecast, since everybody acknowledged the value of the
foreign athletes as well as the degree of their preparation.
Finally, at the starting point of the race at the Marathon
tomb 25 athletes took up position at the starting line. The
race had quite a few fluctuations and almost all the athletes
made a quick start ignoring the fact that they had to save
energy. On the contrary, Louis maintained almost a steady
pace throughout the distance of 40km, which was the official
distance of the race. So, it was a question of time before
he would take the lead a few kilometres from the stadium,
seeing that his main foreign rivals, such as the French Lermusiaux
and the Australian Flack, had abandoned worn out.
Louis' entrance in the Panathenaic Stadium was accompanied
by enthusiastic exultation of the fans both for his high performance
(2.58.50), and for the first place that he had won. The rejoicing
became even stronger when two more Greek athletes arrived
right after Louis, Charilaos Vasilakos (2nd) and Spyros Belokas
(3rd).
Right after his victory Louis received a multitude of offers
and gifts. However, he most gladly accepted a horse and a
carriage in order to carry water more easily from Maroussi
to Athens.
Although Louis became a legend of his time, he never ran in
any other race. He died in March 1940 in Athens at the age
of 67.
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