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Did you know?
- Two torch carriers handed the Olympic flame to Ìuhammad Ali. One was the Greek Voula Patoulidou and the other Evander Holyfield from the United States. Patoulidou had won the gold medal in the 100m hurdles in the Barcelona Olympics (1992), whereas Holyfield had been golden Olympic winner in boxing in the Los Angeles Olympics (1984). Ìuhammad Ali had also been a golden Olympic winner in the Rome Olympics (1960).
- Irena Szewinska was the first female athlete to win a gold medal in the 200m and the 400m in two different Olympic organizations. The athlete from Poland won the 200m in 1968 in Mexico and the 400m in 1976 in Montreal. These were not her only medals, since the athlete had participated in four Olympic organizations winning medals in each one of them. In Tokyo (1964) Szewinska, who then competed under the name Kirszenstein, finished second in the 200m, whereas in Mexico (1968), apart from the gold medal in the 200m, she won a bronze in the 100m. Four years later in Munich she finished third in the 200m. In 1976 in Montreal she won the gold medal in the 400m, in her last appearance in the Olympic Games.
- Merlene Ottey took part in five Olympic organizations winning 8 medals, none of which was gold. In 1980 in Moscow she finished third in the 200m. She finished third in the 1984 Los Angeles Olympics as well, both in the 100m and 200m. In 1988 in Seoul she did not make it among the first three winners (Florence Griffith Joyner, Grace Jackson, Heike Dressler) and finished fourth in the 200m. In 1992 in Barcelona she finished once again third in the 200m, whereas in 1996 in Atlanta she won two silvers, in the 100m and in the 200m, and one bronze in the 4x100m relay. In her last participation in the Olympics, in 2000 in Sydney, she won one more silver medal in the relay race.
- Suleymanoglu contended for the fourth gold Olympic medal in the 2000 Sydney Olympics, without luck though. The 34-year old athlete was disqualified without completing his efforts. Meanwhile, in Sydney two athletes followed his steps and became gold Olympic winners for the third time in a row. These athletes were Pyrros Dimas and Kachi Kachiasvili. A characteristic that the above three eminent weightlifters share is that they were born and shaped, from an athletic point of view, in different countries from the ones they represented as Olympic winners. Dimas came to Greece in 1991 and won his first gold Olympic medal in 1992 in Barcelona. Kachiasvili competed in 1992 with the team of Georgia and came to Greece in 1995. They are the most eminent members of the Greek "dream team", as the Greek weightlifting team was called due to its athletes' successes in all the major games after 1996.
- Fu Mingxia was the first athlete after 36 years to win both diving events in the same Olympic organization. The first athlete to have achieved that was Vicki Draves from the United States in 1948. In 1952 the winner was the latter's compatriot Pat McCormick, who repeated her success in 1956. Lastly, in 1960 the German Ingrid Kramer was the last diver to win both events, until 1996, when Mingxia accomplished the same.
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