Citius, altius, fortius . The slogan of the Olympic Games, which is not really a classic but created by Pierre de Coubertin to inaugurate the 1896 edition, taking it from the frontispiece of a French school, means "Faster, higher, stronger". Of these three adjectives, today we are going to focus on the first, looking at one of the most famous athletes of ancient times and whose specialty was precisely speed:Leonidas of Rhodes.
We don't know much about his life beyond some basic facts and his sporting successes. He was born on the Greek island of Rhodes around 188 BC. and he was probably of affluent status, otherwise he would not have pursued that profession. In Ancient Greece, athletes were free citizens, unlike in Rome, where they had the status of slaves; having freedom meant having no business, that is, enjoying leisure, something that in practice only the upper classes could afford.
Experts also believe that his love of sports surely ran in his family, since Rhodes had a great tradition in this regard and gave birth to several dynasties of athletes. This was the case, for example, of the famous boxer Diagoras, a prince who won the four great games of the time (Olympic, Pythian, Nemean and Isthmian), to whom a statue was erected in Olympia and whose exploits were glossed by Pindar himself.
Legend has it that Diagoras died just after a bystander yelled “You can die now, Diagoras, so don't expect to climb Olympus!” , when his sons (Damageto, Acusilao and Dorieo), also winners at the Olympics in the form of pankration (a combination of boxing and wrestling), celebrated his success by carrying him on their shoulders.
Of course, there were many other athletes who consecrated themselves and went down in history:Agias de Farsalia, pankration champion; Bybon and Eumastas, weight lifters; Calipus of Athens, pentathlete; Cleomedes of Astypalea, boxer (he achieved fame because after an adverse decision by the referee he went mad killing him and then, in his flight, he did the same with dozens of children by knocking down the column that supported his school); Cleitomachus, also a boxer; Milo of Crotona, six-time winner of the Olympic Games and war hero… The list is long.
The fact is that Leonidas became a revolutionary athlete not only because of the victories that he reaped but also because of the way he did it, since he broke the separation that existed then between the sprinters and the endurance athletes. . And it is that he prevailed in the three most important modalities that there were:the stadion , the most prestigious, a test of about two hundred meters (according to the polis ); the devil , which was twice as far; and the hoplitodromos , in which, as his name indicates and unlike in the previous cases (where the participants competed naked), he ran with hoplite armor (helmet, breastplate and shield).
Leonidas was champion in those three tests in the Olympic Games of 164 BC. but he repeated it in the following editions of the years 160 BC, 156 BC and 152 BC, with which he surrounded himself with an aura of invincibility that constituted a double merit, after all, in the last ones he was already thirty-six years old, for then a more advanced age than it is today. In ancient times, medals were not awarded but olive crowns and statues were placed in memory of the greatest; he accumulated twelve medals and a semi-divinized sculpture was dedicated to him with the inscription He had the speed of a god .
Korebos of Elis was the first olimpionike , absolute winner of the Olympic Games thanks to his victory in stadion (whoever won that race used to be proclaimed like this). There were other athletes who stood out in individual races several times in a row, such as Chionis de Esparta, who was the first to win in stadion and diaulo in three consecutive Olympics, in addition to practicing triple jump. So did Astylos of Crotona at stadion y diaulo , although his last triumphant participation was made representing Syracuse and that caused his outraged compatriots to burn down his house.
Leonidas' special merit was being hailed as a triaste (triple), the distinction given to the winners of the three races in the same games. It was quite an honor because there were only seven triastes in Antiquity, although none of the others achieved that title more than once while he did it four in a row. The other six were, in chronological order, Fanas of Pellene, Astylos of Crotona, Nicocles of Akrion, Hekatomnos of Miletus, Polites of Keramos, and Hermogenes of Xanthus; everyone won at stadion, diaulo and hoplitodromo except Polites, who instead of the last modality won the dolicos , a race introduced late and which was the longest (between eighteen and twenty-four furlongs).
Not surprisingly, rhodium received multiple accolades, both in life and posthumously. The sophist philosopher Philostratus of Athens, a contemporary of his, stood out in his work Gymnastic the versatile physical qualities of him and that the geographer Pausanias, also of the time, said of him that he had been the most indisputably famous athlete.
It has taken more than two millennia for a competitor in the Olympic Games to break the record of twelve crowns. American swimmer Michael Phelps did it in Rio 2016 by achieving thirteen medals; however, some of them were in relay events and Phelps also had the double advantage of being considerably younger and being able to rest at least one day between each competition, while the ancient athletes, Leonidas included, had to do all the races on the same day. Those were other times.