Antwerp 1920 Summer Olympics

The 6th Olympic Games were to have been held in Berlin in 1916, but were cancelled due to World War I.

Immediately after the war, the International Olympic Committee (IOC) decided to hand over the organization of the 1920 Games to the Belgian city of Antwerp, out of respect for the hard fate of the Belgian people during the war.

The Games in Antwerp, the Games of the 7th Olympiad, lasted from April to September. Despite the fact that the city had less than a year for preparetion, Antwerp managed to organize the Games in a way that clearly showed that the Olympic idea had survived the World War. Although the conditions were modest, the Belgians were admired everywhere for their enthusiasm and effort in organizing the Games. The Belgian organizing committee was led by Henri de Baillet-Latour, who succeeded the Frenchman Pierre de Coubertin as president of the IOC in 1925. Baillet-Latour thus became the organization's third president [1].

In 1920, the competitions at the Olympic Games were spread over a larger area for the first time. For example, sailing was held in Ostend, rowing on the Grand Canal between Brussels and Antwerp, and shooting in Beverloo.

The Games were attended by approximately 2,600 athletes from 29 nations, largely unchanged from the previous Games in Stockholm eight years earlier. The IOC decided to exclude Germany, Austria, Hungary, Bulgaria, and Turkey from participating in the Games because of their role in the World War. A number of countries, including Brazil, Argentina, New Zealand, Czechoslovakia and Yugoslavia, participated in the Olympic Games for the first time.

The opening ceremony in Antwerp was notable for two reasons in particular. For the first time, the Olympic flag - the five colored rings on the white cloth, the symbol of the cooperation of the five continents - waved over the Olympic stadium during the Games. The flag, which has since been a permanent part of the rituals surrounding the opening and closing of Olympic Games, had been first presented by IOC President Pierre de Coubertin in 1914 in connection with the 20th anniversary of the IOC's founding.

It was also in Antwerp that a representative of the participating athletes took the Olympic oath of fair competition for the first time, which has since become a permanent ritual at the opening ceremonies. The Belgian Victor Boin was the first athlete to take the oath on behalf of all participants. King Albert of Belgium officially opened the Games.

Paavo Nurmi's Olympic debut

The Antwerp athletics competitions were held at the Beerschot stadium, which had a capacity of around 30,000 spectators. Unfortunately, the 390 m long running track was in poor condition, a condition made worse by heavy rain during the competitions. There were 29 disciplines on the athletics program, all for men [2].

At the Games in Antwerp, the international sports world first became acquainted with the Finnish long-distance runner Paavo Nurmi - one of the great figures in Olympic history. He participated in four disciplines in Antwerp and won gold in three and silver in the fourth. With his victories, he laid the foundation for a career as the world's dominant long-distance runner throughout the 1920s.

The 5000 m final was the 23-year-old Finn's first appearance in an Olympic final - and he lost. A match between Nurmi and the Frenchman Joseph Guillemot had been predicted beforehand, a match that brought to mind a similar Finnish-French showdown eight years earlier between Hannes Kolehmainen and Jean Bouin at the Stockholm Olympics. Kolehmainen won in a time that in 1920 still stood as both a world record and an Olympic record.

After three laps of the final, Nurmi took the lead of the field and then set the pace. Joseph Guillemot followed him closely throughout the race, and less than 200 meters from the finish he turned into a sprint that brought him to the finish 20 meters ahead of the Finn. Guillemot thus got revenge for his compatriot's defeat in Stockholm eight years earlier. It would be the last time Nurmi lost to a non-Finn at the Olympic Games.

Results 5000 m M - Athletics Antwerp 1920 ⮞

In the 10,000 m race three days later, Nurmi won the first of his nine Olympic gold medals. Nurmi had learned from his defeat at the half-distance, and this time he made sure to keep up such a hard pace that the sprint was pulled out of Guillemot. Nurmi won the race by a good margin.

Results 10,000 m M - Athletics Antwerp 1920 ⮞

Paavo Nurmi's compatriot Hannes Kolehmainen, the great triumphant from the 1912 Stockholm Olympics, also competed in Antwerp, where he surprisingly won gold in the marathon. The race was held on a day with cold and damp weather, which probably suited the famous Finn very well. The South African Christopher Gitsham led the race from the start, but from 15 km he was joined by Kolehmainen. At 27 km the Finn increased his pace and was now alone in the lead of the race. Shortly afterwards Gitsham had problems with one of his feet and dropped out of the race. After that, everything indicated a sure victory for Kolehmainen, but in the last part of the race Jüri Lossmann from Estonia worked his way up the Finn, so that Kolehmainen finished just 13 seconds ahead of the Estonian. Kolehmainen's finishing time was the world's fastest time ever for a marathon, despite the race actually being 500 m longer than the normal distance.

Results Marathon M - Athletics Antwerp 1920 ⮞

Albert Hill of Great Britain became a double Olympic champion by winning both the 800 m and 1500 m, a double victory that was not repeated until 44 years later by New Zealander Peter Snell at the 1964 Tokyo Olympics. The silver medal in the 1500 m went to Hill's compatriot Philip Noel-Baker, who in 1959 received the Nobel Peace Prize for his work for disarmament. He is the only Nobel Prize winner to have won an Olympic medal.

Results 1500 m M - Athletics Antwerp 1920 ⮞

The gold medal in the 100 m went to the American Charles Paddock in a discipline with 61 participants and a final with four Americans, one Briton and one Frenchman.

Results 100 m M - Athletics Antwerp 1920 ⮞

In the pole vault, another American, Frank Foss, delivered one of the greatest performances in athletics competition by setting a new world record with a jump of 4.09 m on a day of rain and wind at the Olympic Stadium. Perhaps the most impressive was his margin of victory of 37 cm over the competition's runner-up, the Dane Henry Petersen.

Results Pole Vault M - Athletics Antwerp 1920 ⮞

Swimming in the River Scheldt

The swimming competitions in Antwerp were held in a hastily arranged swimming pool in the Scheldt, the river that runs through the city. The water was cold and dark – some of the swimmers claimed it was mud. As the weather was also cold and damp during the Olympic days, the conditions were far from optimal. There were ten events on the swimming program in Antwerp, three for women and seven for men [3].

It was the first time that female swimmers from the United States had participated in the Olympic Games – and what a debut. The American women won all six medals in the two individual events, and in the 4x100 m freestyle, the Americans won by a margin of 29 seconds over the second place team, Great Britain.

Ethelda Bleibtrey from the United States was the big female star at the swimming meet in Antwerp. She won gold in all three women's events on the program. With the preliminary heats, she swam five races in Antwerp, setting world records in all of them.

Results 100 m freestyle W - Swimming Antwerp 1920 ⮞

The men's swimming competitions were dominated by the two Americans, Duke Paoa Kahanamoku and Norman Ross. Famously Kahanamoku from Hawaii had made his Olympic debut eight years earlier in Stockholm, where he won gold in the 100 m freestyle. This time he won two gold medals and Ross three. A third American, Warren Paoa Kealoha, also from Hawaii, won gold in the 100 m backstroke. Only the two breaststroke events were not won by a swimmer from the United States, where the Swede Håkon Malmroth was the best in both races.

Among Duke Kahanamoku's victories was the 100 m freestyle final, where the dominant Duke regained his Olympic title from Stockholm. He won the race not once, but twice, as the final had to be re-swimmed after a protest.

Kahanamoku touched his own world record in the semi-final, and in the final he improved the record further. The final also included Norman Ross and two other Americans, as well as Australian William Herald. During the race, Herald felt harassed by Ross and protested. Ross was then disqualified, and a re-swimming was ordered. Here Kahanamoku was again in a class of his own.

Results 100 m freestyle M - Swimming Antwerp 1920 ⮞

The diving competitions were held in a moat where the water was so muddy that it made it difficult for divers to find their bearings underwater. There were five events on the program, three for men and two for women, and the United States began its dominant role in diving over the following decades by winning gold in three of the events. The women's diving platform competition was surprisingly won by Danish Stefanie Fryland-Clausen.

Results Platform W - Diving Antwerp 1920 ⮞

Winter sports at the Summer Games

There were two winter sports on the program in Antwerp, ice hockey and figure skating, and the Games in Antwerp thus formed a prelude to the first Olympic Winter Games in Chamonix four years later.

It was not the first time that winter sports had been included in the Olympic program. In 1904, figure skating was included in the initial plans for the Olympics in St. Louis, but the competitions were never held. At the Olympics in London 1908, four disciplines in figure skating were held. In 1912, the IOC tried to persuade the Swedish organizers of the Stockholm Games to include winter sports in the program, but the Swedes refused outright, arguing that this would threaten the Nordic Winter Games, which had been held every four years since 1901. During the planning of the 1916 Berlin Olympics, the German organizers worked on plans for a separate event in Schwarzwald for winter sports, but these plans fell through when the 1916 Olympics were canceled due to World War I.

In figure skating, Swede Gillis Grafström won the first of his three Olympic gold medals in his career in the men's individual competition. The women's gold medal also went to Sweden with Magda Julin-Mauroy, and in pairs the Finnish couple Ludovika and Walter Jakobsson won.

Results Individual M - Figure Skating Antwerp 1920 ⮞

Results Individual W - Figure Skating Antwerp 1920 ⮞

results_figure skating_pairsResults Pairs - Figure Skating Antwerp 1920 ⮞

Canada won the first Olympic gold medal in ice hockey in history ahead of the USA and Czechoslovakia in a tournament where, unlike later, seven players were on the ice at a time. Canada then sat on the Olympic throne in ice hockey until 1936, when the Canadians were sensationally defeated by Great Britain at the Winter Games in Garmisch-Partenkirchen.

Results Ice Hockey M - Ice Hockey Antwerp 1920 ⮞

Soccer scandal

In a tournament with 14 participating nations, the football final was played between the host nation Belgium and the newly formed nation Czechoslovakia. Unfortunately, the final turned into a bit of a scandal.

In the Belgian public, the football final was one of the great highlights of the Games in Antwerp, and the Olympic Stadium was filled to capacity with 40,000 enthusiastic spectators. In addition, young fans dug themselves under the fence surrounding the stadium, thereby putting further pressure on the spectator capacity. The organizers were insecure about the start of the match and had therefore arranged for a regiment of soldiers to be stationed around the pitch to prevent spectators from entering the field.

The Czechoslovakian team had done well in the tournament with a combined score of 15-1 in the opening matches. Before the match, the team protested against the presence of the soldiers, as well as being dissatisfied with the referee, the Briton Lewis, who they believed was not objective.

The match got underway, however, and after ten minutes of play Belgium scored from a penalty kick. After half an hour Belgium was 2-0 ahead, and shortly afterwards Czechoslovakia's best player, Steiner, was sent off for rough play. This caused the Czechoslovak team to leave the field and it was not possible to continue the match.

Czechoslovakia was then disqualified, and after some confusion over the medal allocation, it was decided that Spain and the Netherlands would play a match for the silver and bronze medals. Spain won 3-1.

Results Football M - Football Antwerp 1920 ⮞

The water polo tournament was also marked by unrest. Water polo was included in the Olympic Games for the fourth time in Antwerp, and for the fourth time the gold medals were won by Great Britain, who defeated Belgium 3-2 in the final. While Great Britain had come through their preliminary matches with ease, the Belgians had had to fight hard to reach the final. Despite this, there was great confidence among the Belgian fans that their team could fight for victory in the final. This confidence grew even greater when Belgium took the lead 2-1. The disappointment grew even greater when the British won in the end. This led to Belgian spectators attacking the British players, who had to be led off the field by armed guards.

Results Water Polo M - Water Polo Antwerp 1920 ⮞

Cycling with obstacles

There were six disciplines on the cycling program at the Antwerp Olympics, two on the road and four on the track. The track races were held at the Velodrome d'Anvers Zuremborg, a cycling facility with a 400 m long track and space for 14,000 spectators. The four track events were won by riders from four different nations. The sprint was won by the 38-year-old Dutchman Maurice Peeters ahead of two Britons in a competition with 37 participants. In tandem, the gold went to Harry Ryan and Thomas Lance from Great Britain. In the 4 km team pursuit, the British team crossed the finish line first in the final, but the judges approved a protest from the final opponent, Italy, who were then declared the gold winners. Finally, the Belgian Henry George prevailed in a 50 km track race with 21 participants after a close race.

The road race was run over a distance of 175 km. The race started in Merksem, just outside Antwerp, followed a long loop and then finished close to the Antwerp cycle track.

The two road disciplines were both decided on the basis of a single race. The individual race was conducted as a time trial, with riders starting four minutes apart. The team competition was decided by the times of the three best placed riders from each country also counting in the team race. 46 cyclists participated in the race.

Unfortunately, the road route crossed several railway tracks, and in several cases the riders were stopped by passing trains. The race management had dealt with this problem by placing judges at each track crossing to note any delays. This led, among other things, to Henry Kaltenbrun from South Africa being declared the winner of the race first. It was later discovered that the Swede Harry Stenqvist had been held up for over four minutes by a train, and deducting this delay placed Stenqvist in gold almost 1½ minutes ahead of Kaltenbrun. In the team competition, France won ahead of Sweden and Belgium.

Results Road Race M - Cycling Antwerp 1920 ⮞

Suzanne Lenglen dominated tennis

In tennis, France's tennis star, 21-year-old Suzanne Lenglen, completely dominated the women's singles. In the ten sets she played on her way to the gold medal, she lost only nine games, and in the final she easily won 6-3, 6-0 over Dorothy Holman of Great Britain. In addition to the gold in singles, she also won gold in mixed doubles with Max Decugis and bronze in women's doubles.

Results Singles W - Tennis Antwerp 1920 ⮞

Suzanne Lenglen was considered one of the best female tennis players in the world at the time. At the Antwerp Olympics, she competed as the reigning champion of Wimbledon, after the tournament had resumed after the war in 1919. From 1919 to 1925, she won Wimbledon every year except 1924, and lost only one significant singles match during this period. In 1924, illness prevented her from competing at the Paris Olympics.

The men's singles event was marred by the absence of American players, as the Antwerp Games coincided with the U.S. Championships. In the absence of the Americans, the gold medal was won by the South African Louis Raymond, defeating the Japanese Ichiya Kumagae in the final.

Results Singles M - Tennis Antwerp 1920 ⮞

The Games survived the war

Compared to the Games in Stockholm eight years earlier, the Olympic program had been expanded by about 50%. In total, 154 disciplines in 23 sports were competed in Antwerp. Ice hockey was a new Olympic sport, and seven other sports were also reinstated on the Olympic program: boxing, archery, hockey, figure skating, polo, rugby, and weightlifting.

22 of the 29 participating nations won medals at the Games. As many times before, the Games were dominated by athletes from the United States. Of the 154 disciplines, Americans won over a quarter, a total of 41 gold medals.

Italian Nedo Nadi, who won gold in five of the six disciplines in fencing, and American Willis Lee, who won five gold medals in shooting, were the top winning athletes at the Games.

Among other achievements, Swede Oscar Swahn won silver in the team shooting discipline of Running Dear. He was 72 years old, making him the oldest Olympic medalist of the time. American Eddie Eagan won gold in the light heavyweight division in boxing. Twelve years later, he won gold in bobsleigh at the Lake Placid Winter Games.

The Antwerp Games were in many ways marked by the difficult conditions immediately following the First World War. Despite this, excellent sporting achievements were delivered in abundance. The most important result of the Games, however, was probably that the Olympic idea remained viable after an eight-year break and a four-year period when the nations of the world were at war with each other. One could look forward with serenity to the next Olympic Games in Paris in 1924 [4].