Despite the decline, Nurmi went to the Olympic Games in Amsterdam. If he performed well, it would open the door for him to enter the potentially lucrative American track circuit. He won a gold medal in the 10, meters and took silver in the 5, meters and the 3, meters.
According to the Sports Museum Foundation of Finland, when he was 31, Nurmi told a Swedish newspaper reporter, "This is absolutely my last season on the track. I am beginning to get old. I have raced for fifteen years and have had enough of it. By , he had regained some of his old energy and form and set world records in six miles and in 20 kilometers.
In , Nurmi headed for the Olympic Games in Los Angeles, determined to defend his 10, meter record against rivals. He also hoped to win a gold medal in the marathon, just as his hero Hannes Kolehmainen had done in The IAAF barred him from Olympic competition because, they claimed, he was no longer an amateur: he had been paid travel expenses for a tour through Germany in At that time, athletes could only compete in the Olympics if they had not made money from their sport, so Nurmi was out.
Nurmi went to Los Angeles anyway, stayed in the Olympic village and kept training. Runners who saw him reported that he suffered from a foot injury and was barely able to walk. However, his determination was so great that Nurmi ran anyway. Other runners scheduled to compete in the marathon pleaded with IAAF officials to let Nurmi run, but their pleas were ignored.
Barred from running, Nurmi could not bring himself to watch the 10, meters or the marathon. He later claimed that, if allowed to compete, he would have won the marathon by five minutes.
Because he had competed as a professional runner, Nurmi was no longer allowed to compete in international amateur events. In Konigsberg, Germany, on October 4, , he won his last event outside Finland, a 5,meter race.
He continued to run in Finland after that, and was known as the "national amateur. After retiring from running, Nurmi became a businessman and building contractor. He had saved and invested his money since the s and now made a great deal more, mostly through house building; 40 townhouses that his company built are still standing in Helsinki today.
In addition to business, Nurmi sometimes trained other Finnish runners. In , the Olympic Games were held in Helsinki.
As was the tradition, a relay of runners had carried a torch with the Olympic flame from Greece to Finland. No one new who the last runner would be, the one who would bring the torch into the stadium to light the Olympic flame for these Games.
When the electric scoreboard flashed, "The Olympic torch will be brought into the stadium by Paavo Nurmi," the 70,person home crowd was stunned into silence.
Then a huge roar filled the stadium and many Finns burst into tears. Nurmi worked hard all his life and never retired, although an attack of coronary thrombosis slowed him down in the late s. In , he experienced another attack. Nurmi also wanted to run the 10,m but Finnish officials refused to enter him, fearing for his health if he ran in too many races. However, he showed what he was capable of over the distance seven weeks after his last race in Paris and sliced 17 seconds off the world record, a mark which was to last for almost 13 years.
He regained his 10,m Olympic crown in Amsterdam four years later and also got m and m steeplechase silver medals there. In , when Helsinki staged the Olympic Games. At the Paris Games, Nurmi made history by becoming the first athlete ever to win five gold medals at a single Olympic Games. In the space of four astonishing days, Nurmi won the m, the 5,m, the 3,m team event and the two cross-country events. He stole the show at Antwerp , winning golds for the 10,m, individual and team cross-country, and taking silver in the 5,m, all in the space of just three days.
In the Paris Olympics he was untouchable, winning the 1,m before returning to the track just over an hour later in searing heat to win 5,m gold. Two days later Nurmi defended his cross-country titles in temperatures in excess of 40C F before the next day winning the 3,m team race and becoming the first athlete to win five golds at a single Olympics. It could have been six but Finnish team officials, fearing for his health, refused to allow Nurmi to line up for his 10,m defence.
0コメント