Phelps, Bolt, El Guerrouj: Take your pick

14 August 2016 - 02:00 By BBC

Is Michael Phelps the greatest Olympian of all time? The US swimmer's 22 gold medals thus far would appear to end the argument, for no one else has even half as many. Some of the other leading contenders for the podium are Ukrainian-born gymnast Larisa Latynina (18 medals, nine of them gold); Soviet gymnast Nikolai Andrianov (15 medals, seven gold); and mustachioed US swimmer Mark Spitz (nine gold, a silver and a bronze).But the same opportunities are not available to all athletes in all sports.Jesse Owens, winner of four glorious golds in Berlin in 1936, was denied another chance by global conflict and discrimination the black American suffered when he returned to the US from Adolf Hitler's Germany.story_article_left1Latynina's nine golds included all-around titles in 1956 and 1960.Distance runner Paavo Nurmi (nine golds and three silvers between 1920 and 1928) might also have won more had the Finn not been excluded by officials from the 10000m in Paris for health reasons, and banned from the 1932 Olympics for breaking the strict rules governing amateur status after once receiving travel expenses to attend a meet.And what of those who mastered more than one event but won only one gold?Britain's Daley Thompson twice proved himself the greatest decathlete in the world, first at the 1980 Moscow Games aged just 22 and again in Los Angeles four years later, overcoming bigger and stronger rivals across 10 disciplines and two days.Not all medals are equal. Not all Olympians can race over the same distance in different styles. Only a few can compete in relays.Nurmi's record on the track may never be matched, not least because he was running in an era before East African competition.That's not to belittle his achievements - he had just 26 minutes between winning the finals of the 1500m and 5000m in 1924 - but it was a smaller and less diverse field than Hicham El Guerrouj would face when pulling off the same double in 2004.block_quotes_start Bolt has shattered world records after a lunch of chicken nuggets and by running the last 10m with his arms spread wide and a huge grin on his face block_quotes_endThen there is Carl Lewis, with his nine golds across four events over 12 years, seven of them in individual events.When the American sprinter and jumper dominated at the Los Angeles Olympics in 1984, the Eastern Bloc boycott decimated the fields he faced.But he had been ranked No1 in the world over 100m for the previous three seasons, and had won the 100m, 4x100m and long jump at the inaugural world championships the previous year against the best from across the world.Those who span the eras, who maintain their superiority across Olympiads and against different generations of rivals, are deserving of their own glories: British rower Steve Redgrave, with five golds in five Games; German kayaker Birgit Fischer winning eight, over six Olympics, despite having missed those Los Angeles Games as part of the boycott.If not all medals are won the same way, neither do all resonate across the world to the same extent.Owens is famed not only for the number of his golds, but for the message they sent out, at an Olympics hijacked to promote Hitler's abhorrent doctrine of Aryan supremacy.story_article_right2Dutch track athlete Fanny Blankers-Koen had got Owens' autograph in Berlin as a callow 18-year-old. That she came back to the first post-war Olympics in London in 1948 to win four golds, as a mother of two, not only underplayed her athletic gifts (she was prevented from entering the high jump and long jump because athletes were allowed a maximum of four events) but did an incalculable amount to advance the cause of women's sport.And what of Jamaican sprint legend Usain Bolt?Romanian gymnast Nadia Comaneci's fame stems not just from her tally of five golds, three silvers and a bronze, but the perfect 10s that took her to those titles.There is insouciance: Czech distance runner Emil Zatopek winning his third gold at the 1952 Olympics in the marathon, an event he had never run before, and doing so by jogging alongside flat-out favourite Jim Peters and asking the Briton whether they were running fast enough.Bolt has shattered world records after a lunch of chicken nuggets, with his shoelaces undone, and by running the last 10m with his arms spread wide and a huge grin on his face. There has been no one else like him.That may make you warm to him all the more. The only way to settle on the greatest Olympian is to make your own choice for your own reasons. Greatness may come from public deeds, but it is secured by private affections...

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