Aug 19, 2008, 7:05 GMT
Beijing - This day in Olympic history: August 20
2004 - Michael Phelps wins the 100m butterfly at the Athens Games ahead of team-mater Ian Crocker, who had earlier broken Phelps' world record by becoming the first person to swim the 100m butterfly in under 51 seconds. Although lying just fifth at the turn, Phelps manages to win with his last stroke of the swim, giving him his fifth gold medal of the meet.
Phelps announces after the race that he was giving up his place in the 4x100m medley relay to Crocker because he wanted him to win a gold medal too. Phelps wins six gold and two bronze in Athens and follows that up four years later in Beijing with an unprecedented eight gold medals, making him the Olympian with the most number of golds at an individual competition, as well as overall.
1914 - Sohn Kee Chung is born. The Korean marathon runner wanted to compete in the 1936 Olympics, but because his country was at the time occupied by Japanese forces, he had to run for Japan. Adding insult to injury the fervent nationalist Sohn was forced to adopt a Japanese name and ran the marathon at the Berlin Olympic Games as Kitei Sohn. Sohn and his compatriot Nam Seung Yong won gold and bronze respectively and then had to see the Japanese flag raised and Japanese anthem played at the medal ceremony.
A newspaper in Korea published a picture of Sohn a day later on its front page but painted over the Japanese flag. Eight employees were arrested by the colonial government and the paper was forced to cease publication for nine months. In 1948 Sohn was the Korean flagbearer at the 1948 Olympics - the first time the country participated as an independent country. In 1988, the then 76-year-old Sohn brought the Olympic torch into the stadium for the opening of the Seoul Olympics.
1900 - On August 20 the only cricket match ever to be played at the Olympics ends in Paris with an English touring side beating a French side consisting of expatriates living in Paris.
The winners are given silver medals, while the losers get bronze. Years later the IOC upgrades the medals to give the English side gold and the French side silver.
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