Some Random Olympic Facts

Despite the best efforts of President and Mrs. Obama, Jesse Jackson, and Oprah, the city of Chicago was eliminated this morning as a potential host of the 2016 Summer Olympics. The competition came down to Rio de Janeiro, Brazil and Madrid, Spain, with Rio getting the nod.

With this announcement, Rio became the first South American host city of the Olympic Games. Considering the modern Olympics have been around since 1896, it’s pretty amazing that this continent has been skipped over for this long. Anyway, here’s a list of quick Olympic facts to get you through your next cocktail party.

• The United States has hosted more Olympic games than any other country, with 8 (4 Summer Olympics and 4 Winter Olympics).
• The country with the longest drought since hosting an Olympiad is Sweden. Stockholm, Sweden hosted the 1912 Summer Olympics and hasn’t hosted since.
• As of this writing, 3 continents have never hosted the Olympics: Africa, South America, and Antarctica.
• 7 cities have hosted 2 Olympic Games. The International Olympic Committee awarded London the 2012 Summer Olympics, and it will be the first city to host 3 Olympic Games.
• The modern Olympics were envisioned to promote world peace, but they were actually canceled in 1916 because of World War I, and in 1940 and 1944 because of World War II.
• The 1956 Summer Olympics in Melbourne, Australia were the first to be boycotted. The Netherlands, Spain, and Switzerland didn’t attend because of the Soviet Union’s repression of the 1956 Hungarian Uprising. Cambodia, Egypt, Iraq and Lebanon boycotted the Games due to the Suez Crisis.
• The 1956 Summer Olympics were also the first to be held in December because they were the first to be held in the southern hemisphere.

What did I miss? If you have any interesting Olympic factoids, let everyone know about them in the comments!

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