OLYMPIC GAMES.

Auckland Star, Volume LXVII, Issue 181, 1 August 1936, Page 11

OLYMPIC GAMES.

TORCH RELAY RUN.

ATHENS TO BERLIN. PICTURESQUE "KIEL WEEK." (By H. BUTTON WHITELAW.) "May the Olympic Torch he carried 011 throughout the ages with even greater eagerness, courage and honour, for the good of humanity." At the close of the 1930 Olympic Games, this affirmation will echo from the great conclave of athletes gathered together at the Reich Sports Field in Berlin—"-a fitting tribute to these great international contests. Although, at the 1912 session of the International Olympic Committee, the next Games were allotted to Germany,

the Great War intervened, and the succeeding Olympiads were held respectively at Antwerp, Paris, Amsterdam and Los Angeles. Germany, as the nation acting as host for this Eleventh Olympiad, has spared no pains to make this year's celebrations outstanding in, sport's history. The cream of her athletic young manhood —and womanhood, too —has for months past been striving, concentrating and training for the honour of representing their Fatherland; all political strife, and differences have been forgotten ill the greater object of j achieving international athletic supre-1 maey. ! The ancient traditions of German j hospitality will be practised to the full,! and elaborate preparations have been made, not only regarding the actual Games tliemselvas, but also to welcome j fittingly and whole-heartedly the many j thousands of visitors, participants as well as spectators. It is estimated that the Games will provide influx of 300.000 visitors, and, as the existent hotels and pensions will be unable to accommodate all, citizens in suburbs, adjoining, the Olympic, centre are being

asked to place lodgings at the disposal of the committee, and already, at this early date, the response has been both spontaneous and gratifying.

To date no less than 52 nations have signified their intention of sending representative teams to compete in several of the many events listed. Therefore, to assist both visitors and hosts, a special guide and courier bureau lias been established, where several hundred selected young students are undergoing intensive courses not only as guides, but as interpreters also, some 20 different languages being studied.

Trans-European Relay Run. j j Undoubtedly one of the most specta- j 1 cular events of this eleventh Olympiad is the great relay race from ancient! Olympia, In southern Greece, to northern ' Berlin. This is an innovation to past; Games, originating in Athens during the j 1934 session of the International Olvm-1 ; pic Committee's meeting. At this the j suggestion was approved, amid great , enthusiasm, that the Olympic fire fore- • seen in the Olympic statutes should be j kindled in Berlin by fire actually carried across country from Olympia by picked runners. The actual route lies through the main 1 towns of seven countries—Olympia the i starting-post, then on to Athens and j Delphi, both celebrated in ancient classi-1 cal history and mythology; from there' to Salonika, Sofia, Belgrade, Budapest, | 1 Vienna, Prague, Dresden, concluding in ! 1 the Olympia stadium of the German I sports arena in Berlin. | To reenact faithfully the classical race j of olden times, the Olympic fire has been' carried as actual hand-borne burning I torches, each time an exchange of ruif- j ners being made, a second runner holding a flaring reserve torch until the 1 sacred fire has been satisfactorily j kindled in the torch to be carried by the next runner. The final runner sets I alight to-day at the Reich sports | ground, the sacred fire, which burns | continuously for 16 days over the Berlin ! stadium. i This great relay, so reminiscent of the trans-country races of ancient Greece/ extends over a distance of 1837 miles, 1 through Greece, Bulgaria, Yugoslavia'! Hungary, Austria and Czecho-Slovakia to Germany. To cover this great distance,! 3000 athletes were required each making a dash of a thousand metres.! ihe relay began at midday on Julyj 20, and was timed to conclude]

this afternoon, the day of the festival opening of the Games, the runners being chosen from the nationals of the seven countries through which the route lies. "Kiel Week" Boating. The water events, other than swimming, will include rowing, canoeing, and yachting; the former taking place on the traditional course at Gruuau, near Berlin, and the latter two events in Kiel. Bay. To make provision for the various sculling events, the course has been enlarged, and special accommodation provided for spectators, the stands and banks allowing room for forty thousand onlookers; while three large new boathouses have been erected, each taking over two hundred shells. The various sculling races allow for single and double sculls, fours and eights, including a special fours contest without a cox. There will also be canoe racing—which sport German youth is taking up with yearly increasing enthusiasm, this, too, allowing for team entries as well as individual competition.

In the years just before the World ar, yachting as a sport was almost entirely confined to the wealthy German families, and it was not until of very recent years that sailing has in any way become a "popular" sport. Up to a few years ago there were two rival organisations, each having different rules and standards, and it was not until 1930. when the first German sailing champion ship took place, that difficulties weis adjusted, and a union effected. Twenty-one Different Sports. The Olympic Games, in all, embraces no less than twenty-one different sports, including both individual and team contests, of which four events are for women—all, of course, under a strict amateur entrance. During the Games, there will be a special demonstration ot an international sport, in which the United States and Japan have been invited to enter baseball teams; while Germany herself will give a special exhibition of the now popular national sport of gliding.

Simultaneous with the Olympic festivai, the Aero Club of Germany organising an elaborate „ t b-r world amateur flyers. wl -j/ be bodies organising similar ™- stSj and those governing cyclists, motor car drivers. - •,