The True Olympic Spirit

These competitors teach us what the Games are really about

by William Ecenbarger

At the opening ceremony of the Beijing Olympics on August 8, a member of the Chinese team will take an oath on behalf of the 12,000 assembled athletes to abide by the Games’ rules “in the true spirit of sportsmanship.”

Sadly, a few competitors have ignored these high principles at past games with win-at-any-cost tactics, outright cheating and drug use. “There are a few bad apples who spoil the entire spectacle,” says Olympic historian John Lucas. “It is easy to forget that there are far more patriotic and high-minded athletes than there are robber barons and drug cheats.”

Indeed, since the modern games began in 1896, there have been hundreds of outstanding acts of sportsmanship - often unheralded and forgotten - that embody the Olympic ideal. Here are some of the best.

A Helping Hand
Lucien Duquesne  (Amsterdam, 1928)
Paavo Nurmi, the legendary Finnish long-distance runner, carried a stopwatch while racing to pace himself. During a qualifying race in the 3000-metre steeplechase, Nurmi fell at a water jump and dropped his watch.

Lucien Duquesne of France stopped, lifted his rival to his feet and helped him retrieve his watch from the water.
Rather than forge ahead, Nurmi ran the rest of the race by Duquesne’s side and at the finish line offered the Frenchman first place. Duquesne declined.

The Good Loser
Ralph Hill (Los Angeles, 1932)
In one of the most controversial track events in Olympic history, Ralph Hill of the United States came from last place in the 5000-metre race to challenge the leader, Lauri Lehtinen of Finland, who held the world record in the event. With 50,000 spectators cheering him on, Hill tried to pass Lehtinen twice, and both times the Finn blocked his path. Lehtinen won the race by centimetres.

Hill was clearly fouled, but he declined to pursue a formal protest. He said he could not believe Lehtinen would purposely cheat to win. “Besides, what’s wrong with a silver medal?” he was quoted as saying in the New York Times.
Word of Hill’s gesture spread around the world, and the Swedish newspaper Dagens Nyheter called him “the hero of boys and girls who turn out for track and sports in every school.”

For the Love of a Horse
Shunzo Kido (Los Angeles, 1932)
Shunzo Kido, a member of the Japanese equestrian team, was leading  the steeplechase event when he noticed his horse, Kyu Gun, was fatigued and faltering. Kido dropped out of the race rather than risk injuring the animal.

Two years later, a California humane society erected a plaque in Riverside, California, to honour the gesture. It reads that Kido, in choosing to save his horse, “heard the low voice of mercy, not the loud acclaim of glory.”

Shared Glory
Lanny Bassham (Montreal, 1976)
In the small-bore rifle three-position shooting event, Bassham and another American, Margaret Murdock, tied for first place. After a painstaking examination of all the targets, the judges decided that Bassham’s shooting had been slightly better and awarded him the gold medal.

Bassham thought the ruling was based on an absurd technicality, and during the medal ceremony he pulled Murdock up to the gold platform and put his arms around her for the playing of the national anthem. Officially, Murdock won the silver medal and became the first woman to ever receive an Olympic medal for shooting.

A Class Act
Anton Josipovic (Los Angeles, 1984)
In the light-heavyweight boxing semi-final, American Evander Holyfield knocked out Kevin Barry of New Zealand. Holyfield appeared headed for the gold medal match against Anton Josipovic of Yugoslavia until the referee disqualified him for fouling his opponent. Barry was declared the winner, but under Olympic rules couldn’t fight again for at least 28 days after being knocked out. Anton Josipovic of Yugoslavia was awarded the gold medal by default.

Defying calls by American officials to boycott the medal ceremony, Holyfield showed up to collect his bronze medal. The pro-Holyfield crowd booed during the Yugoslavian national anthem. But when Josipovic reached down and invited the American to join him at the top of the platform, the spectators gave him a standing ovation.

Years later Holyfield would say: “I’ve been involved in boxing ever since I was a kid. What Josipovic did, that was the classiest thing I’ve ever seen.”

To the Rescue
Larry Lemieux (Seoul, 1988)
During a race in the one-man Finn Class sailing competition, Larry Lemieux of Canada was in second place when he spotted Joseph Chan of Singapore, who was competing in a different race, flailing in turbulent water well away from his capsized boat. Chan had been thrown from his small craft and was in danger of drowning in the rough seas.

Lemieux veered off course, sacrificing his chance for a medal, and ferried Chan back to his overturned boat. Chan and his teammate were then picked up by a rescue boat.

Officially, Lemieux finished in eleventh place in the tournament, but International Olympic Committee President Juan Antonio Samaranch later awarded him the Pierre de Coubertin Medal for Sportsmanship.

An Unlikely Hero
Bjoernar Haakensmoen (Turin, Italy, 2006)
Canadian Sara Renner was leading her team in the gruelling cross-country team sprint ski race when her left ski pole snapped. She pushed on, but it was hopeless. On an uphill slope, several skiers passed her.

Then something extraordinary happened. A man stepped forward from the side of the course and handed Renner another pole. She got back in the race, made up for lost time and in the end, Canada captured the silver medal.

It was not until after the race that Renner learned the identity of her benefactor - Bjoernar Haakensmoen, the coach of the Norwegian team, which came in fourth. Haakensmoen became an immediate hero in Canada. A Montreal newspaper ran a one-word banner headline - “TAKK,” which is Norwegian for thank you.

Haakensmoen didn’t understand all the attention. “The Olympic spirit is the way we try to follow,” he told a newspaper. “If you win but don’t help somebody when you should have, what win is that?”

– Reader’s Digest Asia, August 2008