Craig & Jay's History of Anything: 1900 Olympic Marathon

By Craig: It was a humid July day in Paris in 1900. Thirteen runners from five nations lined up at the starting line inside of the Olympic stadium. It was extremely hot. The temperature, some say, peaking at 102 degrees. For some absurd reason it was decided by the Olympic officials to start the marathon at 2:30 in the afternoon, the hottest part of the day. Why the race did not start early in the morning when the temperature would have been much cooler is not known. The countries that fielded runners for the days marathon were France, Great Britain, Sweden, Canada, and the United States. The field was not lacking talent. The British contingent consisted of the top three finishers of the grueling 54 mile London to Brighton race which had been held in 1899. Frederick Randall had won that race, and he was accompanied at the Olympic marathon by the 2nd and 3rd place finishers from that event, William Saward, and Ion Pool, who at 42 was the oldest runner in the field. The French, of course, being the host country fielded the most runners. There were five Frenchmen at the starting line led by the formidable Georges Touquet-Daunis, and Emile Champion, another long distance standout. The other French Runners were Michel Theato, Auguste Marchais, and Eugene Besse. The American runner Arthur Newton was one of the favorites. He had won the New York Athletic Club's 15 mile race in 1:28:54 to qualify for the Olympic Marathon. Newton was also the youngest runner in the field at the age of 17. Two Canadian runners started the race. Both of these men Richard Grant, and Ronald J. McDonald, however, were running for the United States since Canada did not have a Track & Field team in the Olympics. McDonald was a force to be reckoned with as he had won the 1898 Boston Marathon. The other two runners in the field both hailed from Sweden. Ernst Fast, and Johan Nystrom.

                                              The Start of the 1900 Olympic Marathon

      The marathon started inside of the stadium where the runners were to run four laps around the track before leaving through an exit. The runners would then find themselves running through the streets of Paris. The first casualty of the race was the Swedish runner Johan Nystrom who dropped out for some unknown reason after the first lap. The twelve remaining runners made a good show of it on the track. From most contemporary accounts of the race, the Frenchman Touquet-Daunis took the lead and led the runners out of the stadium into the Paris streets which were swarming with spectators, bicycles, and other traffic. The British runner, Ian Pool, writing for a Athletic journal after the race describes the mayhem outside of the stadium:

The marathon turned out a dismal fiasco. The whole conduct of the race on the part of the responsible officials, beginning with the tardy date of the announcement abroad down to the smallest details providing, or rather failing to provide, for the convenience of contestants on the fatal day, and the entire absence of precautions to ensure fair play, can only be characterized by the one word "Preposterous" with a capital P. Add to this the non-sporting instincts of the French populace and it will not be necessary to cite fully the details of the troubles that invariably beset the strangers only bicycles and cars for obstacles. At the best it proved a steeplechase, 25 miles is really to far for a steeplechase, but that was with mere circumstance. Suffice it to say that when the three placed men in last year's London to Brighton GAYP found it necessary to retire inside of four miles and Arthur Newton (a well known long distance record breaker in the states), who was unwise enough to finish, took longer than walking time to complete the distance, it shows, it shows that things were very, very wrong."

     Needless to say the three British runners decided that it was a day when they found the unfavorable running conditions outside of the stadium. This left nine runners in the field. Touquet-Daunis led the remaining runners through the clogged narrow streets with the Swedish runner Ernst Fast hot on his heels. After about 12 miles Touquet-Daunis decided that the heat was becoming too unbearable and he noticed a small cafe which he found too irresistible to turn down. He ran inside and downed a few beers. While this ludicrous scene was unfolding, Fast took the lead. What happened next is confusing. The course was not well marked, if marked at all. Apparently Fast took a wrong turn and before he realized his mistake he had lost his lead. It was rumored that a French policeman had given Fast wrong directions which led to the blunder. Be that as it may, Fast never regained the lead. At this point in the race only a few runners remained in the field. At the finish line it was the Frenchman Michel Theato taking the Gold medal with a time of 2:59:45. Champion took the Silver, while Ernst Fast was not to be denied a medal finishing nearly 40 minutes behind Theato to take the Bronze. Only four other runners finished the race. Arthur Newton later made accusations that Theato and Champion had cheated by taking shortcuts through back alleys, and peoples houses. It was said that Theato was some sort of baker's delivery man and was well familiar with the streets in this part of Paris. However, it was later determined that he was not a delivery man at all, but worked as a carpenter by trade.

     The 1900 Olympic marathon, if anything, was a colorful event, even if it was poorly organized. It is hard to imagine one of today's runners stopping in a cafe to have a few beers like Touquet-Daunis which would have led to severe dehydration, never mind stomach cramps if he had continued!

Results of the 1900 Olympic Marathon

1. Michel Theato (France) 2:59:45

2. Emile Champion (France) 3:04:17

3. Ernst Fast (Sweden) 3:37:14

4. Eugene Besse (France) 4:00:43

5. Arthur Newton (U.S.A.) 4:04:12

6. Richard Grant (Canada) Finished,but time unknown

7. Ronald J. McDonald (Canada) Finished, but time unknown

8. Auguste Marchais (France) DNF

9. George Touquet-Daunis (France) DNF

10. Frederick Randall (Great Britain) DNF

11. Ion Pool (Great Britain) DNF