Editing 1900 Summer Olympics (section)

== Sport-by-sport overview ==
The standard of competition at the Games was variable. Despite a poor-quality track, a strong
contingent of top-class American collegiate athletes ensured the track and field competitions were of the highest quality. The tennis gold medalists were all former [[The Championships, Wimbledon|Wimbledon]] champions; swimming and fencing events were of a good standard; and even polo, a minority sport for the social elite, was well represented by some of the best players in the game. Other sports were noticeably weak in both quality and depth. Only athletics, swimming and fencing had competitors from more than ten nations.

=== Archery ===
{{Main|Archery at the 1900 Summer Olympics}}
The history of the archery competition at the 1900 Olympics is one of confusion. The [[IOC]] currently lists six events with Olympic status, but a case has been made that as many as eight other events equally deserve to be considered part of official Olympic history. About 150 archers competed in the six events that later had official status conferred.  However, as many as 5,000 were involved in archery competition in conjunction with the [[1900 World's Fair]]. [[Belgium|Belgian]] [[Hubert Van Innis]] took two gold medals and one silver and would add to his tally twenty years later in [[1920 Summer Olympics|Antwerp]].

=== Athletics ===
[[File:Ray Ewry.jpg|thumb|right|[[Ray Ewry]], the winner of the standing high jump and standing long jump.]]
{{Main|Athletics at the 1900 Summer Olympics}}
The [[track and field]] events were held at the home of the [[RCF Paris|Racing Club de France]] at the Croix-Catelan stadium in [[Bois de Boulogne]]. No track was laid and races took place on an uneven field of grass littered with trees. Additional events were held for professionals and a series of handicap races also took place. These are not considered official Olympic events.

==== The sprints ====
In the seven events contested over 400 metres or less, the United States took 13 out of a possible 21 medals. Athletes from [[Columbia University]], [[Princeton University]] and the [[University of Pennsylvania]] all won gold medals. Indeed, two would-be dentists from the University of Pennsylvania were among the stars of the Games. [[Alvin Kraenzlein]] won 4 individual gold medals, a feat that has never repeated, while [[Walter Tewksbury]] took five medals including two golds. The hurdles in the 400&nbsp;m hurdle race were {{convert|30|ft|m|adj=on}}-long telegraph poles arranged on the track and the race, uniquely in Olympic competition, had a water jump on the final straight. Adolphe Klingelhoeffer, who had Brazilian citizenship in 1900, competed for France in three events.

==== Middle- and long-distance races ====
United States dominance in sprinting was matched in the longer track races by United Kingdom. Only [[George Orton]], who won Canada's first Olympic title in the shorter of the two [[Steeplechase (athletics)|steeplechases]], ruined a perfect record for the British. Orton won his title less than an hour after placing third in the 400-metre hurdles.

==== The Marathon ====
[[File:Marathon des JO de Paris 1900, arrivée de Michel Théato.jpg|thumb|left|Arrival of [[Michel Théato]] during the [[Athletics at the 1900 Summer Olympics – Men's marathon|marathon]], an event which he won, photographed by Jules Beau]]
The most contentious of all the events in these Games began and ended in the Bois de Boulogne. Intended to follow the track of the [[Thiers wall|old city wall]], the course was poorly marked out and runners often got lost and had to double back on themselves before continuing. On some parts of the course, runners had to contend with distractions from cars, bicycles, pedestrians and animals. [[Arthur L. Newton|Arthur Newton]] of the United States finished fifth but stated he had not been passed by any other runner during the race. Another American, [[Dick Grant|Richard Grant]], claimed he was run down by a cyclist as he made ground on the leaders. French honour seemed to have been satisfied when [[Michel Théato]] crossed the finish line and a military band struck up [[La Marseillaise]]. However, modern research has revealed that Théato was born in [[Luxembourg]] and maintained [[Luxembourgian]] citizenship throughout his life.

==== Field events ====
[[File:Rudolf Bauer 1900.jpg|thumb|right|Rudolf Bauer of Hungary won the discus]]
The [[Hungary|Hungarian]] [[discus throw]]er [[Rudolf Bauer (athlete)|Rudolf Bauer]] was the only non-American crowned as Olympic Champion. American domination was even greater in the field events than the track events, with outstanding performances coming from [[Ray Ewry]] and [[Irving Baxter]]. Ewry started his Olympic career with a sweep of the three standing jumps, while Baxter finished second to Ewry three times and won both the [[Athletics at the 1900 Summer Olympics – Men's high jump|regular high jump]] and [[Athletics at the 1900 Summer Olympics – Men's pole vault|pole vault]]. [[Meyer Prinstein]] became the first Jewish Olympic gold medalist in the [[triple jump]].{{citation needed|date=February 2013}}

=== Basque pelota ===
[[File:Pelota1900.jpg|thumb|left|A competitor at the Pelota tournament]]
{{Main|Basque pelota at the 1900 Summer Olympics}}
The [[Basque pelota#Chistera (basket)|chistera]] form of the game was played at this, the sport's only appearance at full Olympic level. Two pairs entered and the Spanish partnerships of Amezola and Villota became their nations' first Olympic champions. The [[Basque pelota#Hand-pelota|mano]] form of the game and a chistera tournament for professional players were contested unofficially.

=== Cricket ===
[[File:Cricket 1900.jpg|thumb|right|Poster of the only Olympic cricket match]]
{{Main|Cricket at the 1900 Summer Olympics}}
After the withdrawal of teams from the Netherlands and Belgium, only two teams played in the cricket tournament. A team made up of players from the Albion Cricket Club and the Standard Athletic Club, two Paris clubs consisting almost exclusively of British expatriates, played a touring team from the southwest of England. The Devon and Somerset Wanderers were no more than a team of competent club cricketers (made up from [[Blundells School]] old boys and members of Castle Cary Cricket Club), and only [[Montagu Toller]] and [[Alfred Bowerman]] were deemed good enough to play at county level for Somerset. The game was played before a small crowd at the [[Vélodrome de Vincennes]]. An emphatic second innings bowling performance from Toller captured victory for the visitors as time appeared to be running out for them. If the French had held out for five more minutes the game would have been a draw.<ref>{{cite news |last=Joint |first=Laura |url=https://www.bbc.co.uk/devon/content/articles/2008/08/21/devon_cricket_olympic_gold_feature.shtml |title=When Devon's cricketers won Olympic gold |publisher=BBC |date=21 August 2008 |access-date=14 July 2013 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160911094310/http://www.bbc.co.uk/devon/content/articles/2008/08/21/devon_cricket_olympic_gold_feature.shtml |archive-date=11 September 2016 |url-status=live }}</ref> Knowledge of the game would have been lost but for the forethought of [[John Symes (cricketer)|John Symes]], a member of the victorious team, who kept a scorecard in his own writing.{{citation needed|date=July 2024}}

=== Croquet ===
{{Main|Croquet at the 1900 Summer Olympics}}
The croquet tournament was notable as it marked the first appearance of women at Olympic level. Madame [[Desprès]], Madame [[Jeanne Filleul-Brohy|Filleul-Brohy]] and Mademoiselle [[Marie Ohier|Ohier]] were eliminated in the first round of competition. All players were French. A single paying spectator attended the tournament, an elderly English gentleman who travelled from [[Nice]] for the early stages. An unofficial two-ball handicap competition was also held. This was also the only Olympiad where croquet was part of the official programme, though there was the variant called [[roque at the 1904 Summer Olympics]].

=== Cycling ===
{{Main|Cycling at the 1900 Summer Olympics}}
The home nation won six of the nine medals available, including one that was initially awarded to Great Britain until this was reversed in 2024.<ref name="change">{{Cite web |url=https://www.npr.org/2024/06/15/nx-s1-5005958/olympics-reassigns-1900-medal-from-britain-to-france |title=Olympics reassigns a 1900 medal—and its winner—from Britain to France |publisher=[[NPR]] |language=en-US |first=Bill |last=Chappell |date=2024-06-15 |access-date=2024-06-15}}</ref> A number of unofficial events were held for both amateurs and professionals.

=== Equestrian ===
{{Main|Equestrian at the 1900 Summer Olympics}}
Equestrian sport made its debut at the Olympic Games with three jumping events being held, plus two other events. The Italian rider [[Gian Giorgio Trissino (equestrian)|Gian Giorgio Trissino]] won a gold and a silver. He narrowly missed making Olympic history by winning two medals in the same event. Competing with two different horses in the high jump, he jointly won the gold medal and finished in 4th place on his second horse.

=== Fencing ===
[[File:ItaloSantelli1900Olympics.jpg|thumb|left|Italo Santelli (left) and Jean-Baptiste Mimiague competing in the masters foil event. Mimiague won both bouts between the two.]]
{{Main|Fencing at the 1900 Summer Olympics}}
Nineteen nations were represented in the fencing competition, which was held in a field near
the cutlery exhibit at the [[1900 World's Fair]].  French fencers dominated the proceedings but both Cuba and Italy also took titles. The early rounds of the foil competitions were judged on style rather than the actual result of the contest. This meant that some fencers were eliminated without losing a contest while others were defeated and still progressed to the next rounds.

=== Football ===
{{Main|Football at the 1900 Summer Olympics}}
The first football champions at the Olympics were the London amateurs of [[Upton Park F.C.]]  A crowd of around 500 spectators saw them defeat their French rivals.

=== Golf ===
{{Main|Golf at the 1900 Summer Olympics}}
[[Margaret Ives Abbott]], a student of art from Chicago, played in and won a nine-hole golf
tournament on an October Tuesday in Paris. She died in 1955 without being aware that the
tournament was part of the Olympic Games and she had become America's first ever female
Olympic champion.

=== Gymnastics ===
{{Main|Gymnastics at the 1900 Summer Olympics}}
135 gymnasts took part in a competition that involved elements from [[track and field]] and
[[Powerlifting|weightlifting]] as well as gymnastic disciplines.

=== Polo ===
{{Main|Polo at the 1900 Summer Olympics}}
Eight separate tournaments were held in 1900 as part of the [[1900 World's Fair]]. Only the Grand Prix Internationale de l'Exposition is counted as an official medal event. Entries were from clubs rather than countries, and the winning Foxhunters club comprised English, Irish and American players.

Mexico won its first medal in this sport, a bronze won by Guillermo Hayden Wright, Marquez de Villavieja and three brothers: Eustaquio de Escandón y Barron, Pablo de Escandón y Barron and Manuel de  Escandón y Barron.

=== Rowing ===
{{Main|Rowing at the 1900 Summer Olympics}}
Competitions were held on the [[River Seine]]. The coxed fours event descended into disarray after the officials changed the qualifying criteria for the final several times, culminating in two finals: the first final was held without the original qualifiers, who boycotted the race to protest the decision to run six boats on a course laid out for four boats. Following this, officials decided to run another final for the boycotting crews. Both events are considered official Olympic competitions.

In a number of events, crews saw the advantage of having ultra-lightweight coxswains and recruited local boys for race days. Most of these remain a mystery; some could have been under ten years old.

=== Rugby union ===
[[File:Rugby1900.jpg|thumb|right|Scoreboard with result of France-Germany rugby game]]
<!-- Missing image removed: [[File:Frantz reichel 1903.jpg|thumb|left|Frantz Reichel of France, athlete in 1896, member of winning Olympic rugby team in 1900]] -->
{{Main|Rugby union at the 1900 Summer Olympics}}
Three teams competed in the Rugby tournament. A French representative team defeated a team from the German city of [[Frankfurt]] and [[Moseley Wanderers]] from England. The Moseley team had played a full game of rugby in England the day before they made the journey to Paris. They arrived in the morning, played the match in the afternoon and were back in their home country by the next morning. The proposed game between the British and German sides was cancelled, and both are credited as silver medalists. The Franco-Haitian centre [[Constantin Henriquez]] become the first black gold medalist.

=== Sailing ===
[[File:Sailing1900.jpg|thumb|left|The Olympic regatta]]
{{Main|Sailing at the 1900 Summer Olympics}}
The 1900 sailing regatta differs from every other Olympic regatta in a number of ways.
In most classes, there were two distinct "finals", boats were assigned time handicaps according to their weight within each class and cash prizes were handed out to the winner of each race. The [[IOC]] initially recognized the winner of the first race in each class as Olympic champion except in the case of the 10-20 ton class, which was decided on aggregate time over three races. However currently the participants of both first and second races in 3 classes (0-0.5t, 1-2t and 2-3t) are present in the <ref name=IOC1900Sailing>{{cite web|title=Paris 1900 Sailing Results|url=https://olympics.com/en/olympic-games/paris-1900/results/sailing|publisher=International Olympic Committee|access-date=31 January 2022}}</ref> as medalists, so the second races in these 3 classes were recognized by the IOC, as recommended by Olympic historian [[Bill Mallon]].<ref name="Mallon"/> To support the recognition of a total of 95 medal events per Mallon's suggestion, one more race in each of 2 other classes (0.5-1t and 3-10t) has been recognized by the IOC. Thus, for five of the eight events, two gold, two silver and two bronze medals were retrospectively awarded. Races were held at both [[Meulan]] and [[Le Havre]] and medals shared among five nations. France and Great Britain were the most successful of the countries involved. A number of people named as members of medal-winning crews by the [[IOC]] have been proved not to have competed; others have their participation seriously questioned by historical research.

=== Shooting ===
{{Main|Shooting at the 1900 Summer Olympics}}
Switzerland's [[Konrad Stäheli]] was the outstanding marksman of the Games, taking a trio of titles and leading his country to the top of the shooting medal table. The medals were shared between six different nations. There is a debate as to whether the live pigeon shooting event was a full Olympic event, Belgian Leon Lunden shot twenty-one birds on his way to the championship. Up to thirty unofficial shooting events were also held, most involving professional marksmen. Research has shown that one of the medal events in the IOC database (25m rapid fire pistol, also called military pistol cat. 6) was contested by professionals.<ref name="Mallon"/>

=== Swimming ===
[[File:Swimming 1900.jpg|thumb|right|Swimming race in the river Seine]]
{{Main|Swimming at the 1900 Summer Olympics}}
The muddied waters of the [[Seine]] hosted the swimming events in 1900. Run with the current, the races produced very fast times by the standards of the day. [[John Arthur Jarvis]] of Great Britain, [[Frederick Lane]] of Australia and the German [[Ernst Hoppenberg]] each won two titles. Lane received a 50-pound bronze statue of a horse as a prize. A couple of unusual events were held. The obstacle race required both swimming underneath and climbing over rows of boats while Charles de Venville stayed submerged for over a minute to
win the underwater swimming event.

=== Tennis ===
[[File:Charlotte Cooper.jpg|thumb|left|Charlotte Cooper, the first individual female Olympic champion]]
{{Main|Tennis at the 1900 Summer Olympics}}
[[File:Tennis_women_1900.jpg|alt=|thumb|French contestant at the 1900 Olympic Games tennis tournament, at the Tennis court Cercles des Sports de l'Ile de Puteaux, Paris. Cover page of magazine ''La vie au grand air'', No 97 from July 22, 1900.]]
A high-quality men's tournament saw three past or future [[The Championships, Wimbledon|Wimbledon]] champions reach the semi-finals. [[Laurence Doherty]] reached the final when older brother [[Reginald Doherty|Reggie]] stepped aside and let his sibling advance to the final. The two refused to play each other in what they considered a minor tournament. On the 11th of July a landmark was reached in the history of the Olympic Games. [[Charlotte Cooper (tennis)|Charlotte Cooper]], already three times Wimbledon champion, took the singles championship to become the first individual female Olympic champion, also winning the mixed doubles event.

=== Tug of war ===
[[File:Tug of war.jpg|thumb|right|A combined Swedish/Danish team beats France for Gold in the tug of war]]
{{Main|Tug of  war at the 1900 Summer Olympics}}
A combined Sweden/Denmark team, made up of three competitors from each country, defeated the French team to win the title. One of the members of the French team was a Colombian citizen. They were left as the only participating teams; the United States  had entered but were forced to scratch as three of their team were involved in the final of the hammer. [[Edgar Aabye]] was a journalist covering the Games for the Danish newspaper [[Politiken]] and was asked to join the team when another puller was taken ill.

=== Water polo ===
{{Main|Water polo at the 1900 Summer Olympics}}
Osborne Swimming Club, representing Great Britain, were unchallenged in the tournament, scoring 29 goals and conceding only 3 in their 3 matches. In the final, they limited the number of shots on goal to avoid humiliating their opponents. One of its team members, [[Victor Lindberg]], was from New Zealand, while [[Thomas William Burgess]] of the bronze medal-winning Libellule de Paris team represented Great Britain in the swimming events.