PHOTO FINISH: Olympic competitors dive into the pool at the start of the 400-meter freestyle men's swimming race at the Summer Olympic Games in Los Angeles, Ca., Aug. 10, 1932. Buster Crabbe (below as Flash Gordon) of the United States, nearest the camera, won gold setting an Olympic record
At the Summer Games, winning and losing are never more than a split second apart. So as athletes from 202 countries descend on Athens, Time looks back at some of the closest finishes in Olympic history—moments that expand our very sense of what an instant can contain
Los Angeles/1932 Women's 200-m Breaststroke
How did a 16-year-old Australian schoolgirl end up winning one of the closest swimming races in Olympic history? By listening to advice from Flash Gordon. American matinee idol Buster Crabbe, star of Tarzan and the Flash Gordon movies and a two-time Olympic freestyle medalist, spotted Clare Dennis' talent when she swam the fastest heat in the women's 200-m breaststroke at the L.A. Games. He decided to give her a tip that she hadn't learned in Sydney. Take three full strokes underwater at the start of the race, he advised, to boost speed. (This was before the single underwater stroke limit was introduced in 1956.) Crabbe's advice worked, and Dennis went on to beat Hideko Maehata of Japan by just 0.1 sec. Dennis came to Los Angeles a rank outsider, but became the only non-American female swimmer to win gold at the Games.
Berlin/1936 Women's 80-m Hurdles
Hitler wasn't pleased. The black track-and-field star Jesse Owens broke the world record for the 100 m in a heat on the first day; he won the final on the second day, again in world-record time; and he won the broad jump with yet another record on the third day. So much for the superiority of the Aryan race. TIME reported that Der Angriff, the German paper run by Propaganda Minister Joseph Goebbels, complained that "the Yankees, heretofore invincible, have been the great disappointment of the games ... Without these members of the black race — these auxiliary helpers — a German would have won the broad jump." Goebbels had to do some more spinning when German favorite Anni Steuer lost in the women's 80-m hurdles to Trebisonda Valla of Italy. Valla ran the semifinal in 11.6 sec., which was recognized as an Olympic record, but not a world record. In the final, Steuer was on the inside of the track while Valla, the Canadian Elizabeth Taylor and Italian Claudia Testoni held the outside. Valla got off to the best start, with Steuer last over the first hurdle, and just managed to retain the lead. She finished in 11.7 sec., the same time as Steuer, Taylor and Testoni. Although their times were identical, the judges spent 30 minutes examining images from the the photo finish, which also listed the runners' times in thousandths of a second. Valla came in first, just 0.061 sec. ahead of Steuer. Taylor was third and Testoni fourth, a full 0.07 sec. behind Valla.
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Is She the Next Nadia? [Jul. 05, 2004]
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Athens Clears A Hurdle [May. 24, 2004]
The Olympic Stadium is topped off and gets a big thumbs-up for its prep work
The King of Racewalking [May. 31, 2004]
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Going to the Temple of Love [May. 24, 2004]
A sailor's tribute to Aphrodite is uncovered by Olympic constructors
How Safe Is Athens? [May. 17, 2004]
Bombs go off 100 days before the Olympics begin. A look at who may have planted them, and how officials plan to secure the Games
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