Lorenzo R v R
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The first Olympics held in Paris, in 1900, were a farce. Coubertin had intended them to serve as the sporting component of the Exposition Universelle. Its chief organiser, Alfred Picard, was less keen, dismissing Coubertin’s games for a few hundred amateur male athletes as ‘cheap and unfit to represent the nation’, while the neo-Hellenism of the Olympic movement was seen as an ‘absurd anachronism’. The official programme of the exhibition included a range of sports that were popular in late 19th
The first Olympics held in Paris, in 1900, were a farce. Coubertin had intended them to serve as the sporting component of the Exposition Universelle. Its chief organiser, Alfred Picard, was less keen, dismissing Coubertin’s games for a few hundred amateur male athletes as ‘cheap and unfit to represent the nation’, while the neo-Hellenism of the Olympic movement was seen as an ‘absurd anachronism’. The official programme of the exhibition included a range of sports that were popular in late 19th
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popular in late 19th-century France: motor races and ballooning, fishing and pigeon racing, as well as mass displays featuring thousands of gymnasts and archers, golf and polo parties, school sports, events for women and children, and – least Olympic of all – professionals competing in tennis, pelota and cycling.
Undeterred, Coubertin in effect decreed that the events in the exhibition’s sporting programme that didn’t involve motor vehicles, professionals, children or animals were Olympic events. The press was confused, describing these contests as festival games, Olympian games and international games. The public didn’t pay much attention. Just one paying spectator seems to have attended the croquet. No laurels or certificates were awarded. Many of the winners were surprised to discover, years later, that they had participated in the Olympics. ‘It’s a miracle that the Olympic movement survived,’ Coubertin admitted.
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