Athletics at the 1900 Summer Olympics – Men's marathon

Men's marathon at the Games of the II Olympiad
The early stages of the race
Venue	Paris
Date	July 19
Competitors	14 from 5 nations
Winning time	2:59:45
Medalists
Michel Théato  Luxembourg Émile Champion  France Ernst Fast  Sweden
← 1896 1904 →

Athletics at the 1900 Summer Olympics
Track events
60 m	men
100 m	men
200 m	men
400 m	men
800 m	men
1500 m	men
110 m hurdles	men
200 m hurdles	men
400 m hurdles	men
2500 m steeplechase	men
4000 m steeplechase	men
5000 m team race	men
Road events
Marathon	men
Field events
Long jump	men
Triple jump	men
High jump	men
Pole vault	men
Standing long jump	men
Standing triple jump	men
Standing high jump	men
Shot put	men
Discus throw	men
Hammer throw	men
v t

The men's marathon was a track & field athletics event at the 1900 Summer Olympics in Paris. It was held on July 19, 1900. 13 athletes from five nations competed in the marathon, which used a distance of 40.26 kilometres.

The winner, Michel Théato, was a native of Luxembourg who was living in Paris. At the time, competitors were not selected and entered by National Olympic Committees. As such, Théato was recorded as being French. Decades later, after his true nationality was determined, the Grand Duchy of Luxembourg lodged a complaint with the International Olympic Committee and petitioned to change the Olympic record of Théato's nationality; this complaint was rejected in 2004.^[1]

In 2021, the IOC records for the 1900 Games were updated to reflect medalists' nationalities in this and eight other events.^[2] This race result now stands as Luxembourg's first ever Olympic medal.^[3] Ernst Fast's bronze was Sweden's first medal in the event.

Summary[]

The marathon race, which began at 2:30 p.m. in temperatures of 39 °C (102 °F ^[4]), wound through the streets of Paris.

While 20 runners entered, only thirteen started, with seven finishing the race: one dropped out during the four laps around the track that preceded the road running. Touquet-Daunis led until he was overcome by the heat, and subsequently retired from the race.

Fast took the lead, but had tired himself trying to keep pace with the Frenchman, and was passed by Théato and Champion before the end.

Background[]

This was the second appearance of the event, which is one of 12 athletics events to have been held at every Summer Olympics. None of the runners from 1896 returned. The marathon, invented specifically for the 1896 Olympics, was not quite as much a novelty as four years prior; the Boston Marathon had been run every year starting in 1897, and the 1898 winner, Ronald MacDonald of Canada, was among the runners at the 1900 Olympics.

Canada, Great Britain, and Sweden appeared in the event for the first time. France and the United States were the only nations to have runners in both of the first two Olympic marathons.

Competition format[]

The marathon was a single-race competition. The distance for the event had not yet been standardized; the 1900 version used a course that was 40.26 kilometres in length (compared to the approximately 40 kilometres of 1896 and the 42.195 kilometres later set as the standard). The course started with four laps of the track in the stadium before running through the streets of Paris.^[5]

Records[]

These were the standing world and Olympic records (in hours) prior to the 1900 Summer Olympics. Marathon distances were not standardized, and world records or bests were not officially recognized, until 1924.

World record	n/a	n/a	n/a	n/a
Olympic record	Spyridon Louis (GRE)	2'58:50(*)	Athens, Greece	10 April 1896 (NS)

(*) Distance was 40 kilometres

Schedule[]

Results[]

Rank	Athlete	Nation	Time
	Michel Théato	Luxembourg[2]	2:59:45
	Émile Champion	France	3:04:17
	Ernst Fast	Sweden	3:37:14
4	Eugène Besse	France	4:00:43
5	Arthur Newton	United States	4:04:12
6	Dick Grant	United States	Unknown
7	Ronald J. MacDonald	Canada	Unknown
—	Auguste Marchais	France	DNF
	Johan Nyström	Sweden	DNF
	E. Ion Pool	Great Britain	DNF
	Frederick Randall	Great Britain	DNF
	William Saward	Great Britain	DNF
		Great Britain	DNF[5]
	Georges Touquet-Daunis	France	DNF
—	Emilio Banfi	Italy	DNS
	John Cregan	United States	DNS
	Alexander Grant	Canada	DNS
	John Maguire	Great Britain	DNS
	Martens	France	DNS
	Jakub Wolf	Hungary	DNS
	Ettore Zilia	Italy	DNS

Sources[]

Specific

General

• International Olympic Committee results database
• De Wael, Herman. Herman's Full Olympians: "Athletics 1900". Accessed 18 March 2006. Available electronically at [1].
• Mallon, Bill (1998). The 1900 Olympic Games, Results for All Competitors in All Events, with Commentary. Jefferson, North Carolina: McFarland & Company, Inc., Publishers. ISBN 0-7864-0378-0.