The Summer Olympics is a celebration of extraordinary athleticism, agility and ability, where prodigious natural talent and years of exceptional commitment and dedication are decanted into a few weeks of frenetic action, as the planet’s elite meet and compete in front of an audience of billions. In a fractious and often divided world, the fact the Games happen at all is, perhaps, one of our species’ greatest ongoing achievements, but the capacity for this festival of sport to entertain and inspire is incredible – not least because it can introduce us to sports we didn’t even realise existed.
The Games last took place in Paris exactly a century ago, and now the French capital is set to become the first city to host the modern Olympics three times. The first time around, in 1900, it saw some spectacularly strange sports. Back then audiences enjoyed watching competitors doing the long jump – nothing weird about that you might think, but this version of the long jump was done on a horse. And then there was the high jump (yes, also on a horse). And live pigeon shooting (a bloody affair, during which over 300 birds were killed). And poodle clipping – admittedly, this last one was more of an exhibition event, but it was still highly competitive, and saw 128 participants speed-clipping curly haired canines in front of a 6,000-stong crowd in Bois De Boulogne park. True story.
