Greek Olympians Trivia Quiz

Answer: Spyridon Louis

The marathon in 1896 was the game in which the Greek delegation wanted to excel. And sure they did! Seventeen athletes started the race over 40km: 13 Greeks plus four athletes from four other countries. The French, American and Australian runners dropped out, as well as five of the Greeks. Spyridon Louis won in 2:58:50, followed by his compatriots Charilaos Vasilakos and Spyridon Belokas. However, Belokas was disqualified because he used a chariot for part of the race. The Bronze medal thus went to the only non-Greek competitor who finished the race: Gyula Kellner from Hungary.

The Greeks who did finish regularly but won no medals, were Ioannis Vrettos, Eleftherios Papasymeon, Dimitrios Deligiannis, Evangelos Gerakeris and Stamatios Makouris. Spyridon Louis (1873-1940) was normally occupied as a water carrier. Athens had no running water at that time, and Spyridon transported fresh mineral water to Athens, where his father sold it at the market. During the second millennium no other Greek would ever win the marathon. 

Answer: Pyrros Dimas

Pyrros Dimas was born in Albania in 1971. He obtained his Greek nationality in 1992 and was immediately selected to represent Greece in the weightlifting competition. In 1992 Pyrros Dimas won the light heavyweight class before the Polish Krzysztof Symion.

In 1996 he won before the German Mark Huster and the Pole Andrzej Cofalik. Pyrros also established two World Records at the 1996 games. In 2000, Pyrros won again before Marc Huster and the Georgian Georgi Asanidze. This time Pyrros bettered the Olympic Record for the Clean and Jerk movement. Pyrros ended his Olympic career at the 2004 Games, with a bronze medal (after Georgi Asanidze and the Belarussian Andrei Rybakou).

Answer: Ioannis Frangoudis

Frangoudis (1863-1916) was born in Cyprus but enlisted in the Greek army, where he attained the rank of Lieutenant General. He also taught at the military academy for aspirant officers in Evelpidon. At the 1896 Olympics, Frangoudis competed in various shooting events.

He won third place in the free pistol shooting at 30 metres (after the American Sumner Paine and the Dane Holger Nielsen). In the rifle shooting at 300 metres, he ended second to his compatriot Georgios Orfanidis. In the 25 metre muzzle loading pistol Fragoudis won gold, Orfanidis ended up second and Holger Nielsen was third.

Answer: Sofia Bekatorou

Sofia Bekatorou (born 1977) and Emilia Tsoulfa (born 1973) were the huge favourites for the women's two person dinghy sailing in 2004. They had previously won four consecutive World Championships in this event. The competition went over eleven races, of which the ten best results would determine the final standing.

After ten races Bekatourou and Tsoulfa had such a large advance they didn't need any result for the last race. Bekatorou would also compete in the women's yngling keelboat in 2008 (together with Virginia Kravarioti and Sofia Papadopoulou).

Here the Greek team won a bronze medal (after Great-Britain and the Netherlands).

Answer: Ioannis Melissanidis

At the Olympic games in 1996, all competitors had to enter the team all-round competition - even if the team consisted of a single competitor, as was the case for the Greek delegation. Ioannis Melissanidis (born 1977) was the only Greek gymnast at the 1996 Games. For each apparatus the eight best competitors would place for the individual finals, with the limit that not more than two gymnasts of each country could qualify for the finals.

In the qualifying, Melissanidis scored fourth on the floor exercise. So he went to the finals, with the favourite being the Belarussian Vitaly Scherbo. In the final the eight competitors started again from scratch, and this time Melissanidis prevailed. He took the gold with a score of 9.85 out of 10, before the Chinese Li Xiaoshuang and the Russian Alexey Nemov.

Answer: Ilias Iliadis

Ilias Iliadis was born in Georgia in 1986 and has always competed for Greece since the start of his career. At the Olympic Games of 2004, he was by far the youngest participant. He won his four pool matches and went to the final against Roman Gontyuk from the Ukraine. In this final Iliadis won by ippon. In the Olympic Games in 2008 Iliadis lost in the first round. In 2012 he won a bronze medal.

Answer: Ioannis Georgiadis

At the sabre event in 1896, the competition was restarted after the arrival of the Greek royal couple, so they could see unfold the complete competition. Five amateur fencers fought against each of the opponents. The Austrian Adolf Schmal was the absolute favourite, but he won only one of his matches, thus ending in fourth place. Georgiadis (1876-1960) won all of his matches, and his compatriot Tilemakhos Karakalos won three out of the four matches. So Georgiadis took gold and Karakalos won silver. Third place was for the Danish Holger Nielsen, and the Greek Georgios Iatridis closed the ranks.

Answer: Mikhail Mouroutsos

Taekwondo was a new Olympic discipline in 2000. The men's flyweight competition had 14 contenders, of 14 different countries. Mouroutsos (born 1980) won all four of his matches and thus claimed the gold medal. The Spaniard Gabriel Esparza won silver, and bronze was for Huang Chi-Hsiung from Taipei.
Mouroutsos would also compete in the 2004 Olympics, but this time he was eliminated in the second round.

Answer: Stelios Mygiakis

Stelios Mygiakis was born in 1952. He entered the wrestling competition (Greco-Roman style) in the Olympic Games of 1980. He won three out of four matches in the preliminary round. In the finals he won against the Hungarian Istvan Toth and against the Russian Boris Kramorenko, thus winning the first wrestling gold medal ever for Greece.

Answer: Thomas Bimis

At the 2004 Olympic Games, Greece had entered a team for the synchronized diving event. But neither Thomas Bimis (born 1975) nor Nikolaos Siranidis (born 1976) were amongst the favourites. Bimis and Siranidis had each competed in the individual diving events in 2000, but without success.

After four out of five dives, the Chinese favourites were comfortably at the lead. But they missed completely at their last dive and scored nil points. The American team, at that moment in second place, made also a messy final dive, as did the Russians (the other favourites).

The Greek pair scored with the most difficult dive from the eight competing teams and claimed the gold. Silver went to Germany and Bronze to Australia, while the two favourite teams ended up seventh (Russia) and eighth (China).