Ancient Olympics

Ancient Olympics: The ancient Olympics were notably different from today’s Olympics. In ancient Greece the Olympics that were held consisted of much less events, they were only held in the town of Olympia located in Greece opposed from moving around like they do today. Only free men of Greece were prohibited to participate in the Olympics, unlike today where every country participates. There were also similarities between ancient Olympics, and the Olympics held today, the winners were credited as heroes of their town in the ancient period, today the winners are seen as heroes of their country and bring positive attention to where they come from. One thing that made ancient Olympics very different from todays is the fact that in ancient Greece the athletes had to perform the events in the nude, they did this because they believed this was the way the gods made them. Boxing was one of the events held in the ancient Olympics, it was very different than boxing is today, there were no rounds and they just fought until somebody was knocked out, also the boxing gloves didn’t consist of much padding at all and were normally just leather straps. Another common sport in the ancient Olympics was chariot racing, there were two types of chariot racing, two horse and four horse. The course was nine miles long, which was twelve laps around the stadium. One of the greatest ancient Olympian athletes was Milo of Kroton, he was a wrestler and a six-time victor. Milo was born in southern Italy and according to ancient records he loved showing off his strength, he would hold a pomegranate so tightly in his had nobody could retrieve it; however the fruit would be undamaged. Milo won the boys wrestling event in 540 B.C, h returned eight years later to win the first of five consecutive wrestling titles. Even in today’s world this would be an extraordinary feat, finally when he was in his forty’s he was defeated by a much younger competitor. The ancient Olympics were a huge part of a