Post a coin. Longest olympic marathon time ever.

[SkyMan]

In the 1912 summer olympics, held in Stockholm, Sweden, Kanakuri Shizō, a Japanese marathon runner, went missing during the race. He stopped at a party taking place in a villa on the marathon route in order to quench his thirst, before catching a train to Stockholm and left the country the next day. He returned to Japan without notifying race officials. He completed the race 50 years later after being invited back by the Swedish authorities with a (unofficial) time of 54 years, 8 months, 6 days, 8 hours, 32 minutes and 20.3 seconds.

 

In honor of the start of the 2012 summer olympics post a gold, silver or bronze coin from a year that held the summer olympics (e.g. 2012, 2008, 2004... 1896)... or post a numismatic item having to do with quenching one's thirst.

 

[Old Pueblo]

My wife is a gymnastics coach here in Tucson. She lives and breaths gymnastics.

I sent here to Olympic Trails in San Jose a month ago for the 2011 Christmas gift.

This is her one coin from me. (I wanted to get her a Liberty Nickel )

 

 

"Faster, Higher, Stronger"

 

 

GO USA!

[jerseycat10]

[RWB]

Hmmm...where did Kanakuri Shizō place in the race?

[BROADSTRUCK]

[RockMyAmadeus]

The first Modern Olympics commemorative coin:

 

 

[Keigwin]

If I could go back in time to witness the Olympic games it would be 1936, Berlin.

Lance.

 

[SkyMan]

If I could go back in time to witness the Olympic games it would be 1936, Berlin...

 

I agree, although I think it'd be pretty interesting to see aspects of the Moscow 1980 Olympics too. After all, a parade of uniformed people, goose-stepping while holding up a white dove [an actual part of the opening(?) ceremony] would be an amusing Orwellian touch.

 

I think that Berlin would be better in the sense that you have various black athletes, notably Jesse Owens, winning gold and stomping the Nazi racist ideologues. I have to admit though, I did not realize until this evening, while looking it up, that Germany actually won more medals by a substantial margin than any other country, winning 89 medals in total, while the second place country was the US with 56 medals. I always assumed the US beat the Germans in total medals, but that is not the case. The Germans beat the US in all 3 categories (gold, silver, bronze) by substantial margins.