Olympics: 26 Jul – 11 Aug 2024
Paralympics: 28 Aug – 8 Sep 2024
Paris welcomed the world back to the Games, staging the first post-COVID-19 Olympics and Paralympics. This sentiment came through in the Games’ theme: Games Wide Open.
For the first time in Olympic history, the Games achieved gender parity–that is, an equal number of male and female athletes (not to be confused with gender equity or equality, as we discussed on an episode of the podcast). About 10,500 athletes from 206 National Olympic Committees (NOC), the IOC Refugee Olympic Team, and Neutral Olympic Athletes came to Paris for these Games.
Athletes participated in a total of 32 sports and 329 events. Host cities are allowed to choose sports to add to the set Olympic program. Paris opted to keep sport climbing, skateboarding, and surfing on the program (those sports debuted at Tokyo 2020), and it added breaking.
Several events also debuted at Paris 2024: Extreme canoe slalom, mixed team race walk, kiteboarding and mixed 470 sailing. In Tokyo, sport climbing was one medal event made up of three disciplines. Paris combined boulder and lead into one event.
We love it when countries win their first medals and their first gold medals. Athletes at Paris did not disappoint. Four NOCs won their first medal:
- Albania: Bronze to Chermen Valieva – wrestling, freestyle (men’s 74kg)
- Cape Verde: Bronze to David de Pina – boxing (men’s 51kg)
- Dominica: Gold to Thea LaFond – athletics (women’s triple jump)
- Saint Lucia: Gold to Julien Alfred – athletics (women’s 100m)
The Refugee Olympic Team also won its first medal when boxer Cindy Ngamba won bronze in the women’s 75kg.
Four NOCs won their first Olympic gold medal:
- Botswana: Letsile Tebogo – athletics (men’s 200m)
- Dominica: Thea LaFond – athletics (women’s triple jump)
- Guatemala: Adriana Ruano Oliva – shooting (women’s trap)
- Saint Lucia: Julien Alfred – athletics (women’s 100m)
Although Paris is a three-time Olympic host, 2024 was the first time it hosted the Summer Paralympics. About 4,400 athletes took part, the most for a Summer Paralympics.
Athletes competed in 22 sports and 549 events (yes, the Paralympics has more events than the Olympics!). Athletes represented 180 National Paralympic Committees, the Refugee Paralympic Team, and Neutral Paralympic Athletes.
No new sports were on the Paralympic program at Paris 2024.
The Paralympic Refugee Team made a splash by getting on the podium twice. Zakia Khudadadi won the team’s first medal, a bronze, in women’s para taekwondo K44-47kg, and para athletics runner Guillaume Junior Atangana added a second bronze to the team’s tally for his third-place result in the men’s T11 400m.
Daily Podcast Coverage
What can you tell me about the Paris logo?
For the first time, the same logo is being used for both the Olympics and the Paralympics. The logo itself can look like two different things: (1) a white flame in front of a gold medal, or (2) Marianne (the gold medal looks like her hairline, and the little cauldron looks like her lips). Marianne is a French icon, a symbol of the Republic who personifies liberty, equality and fraternity.
Source: Paris 2024.
Who are the mascots?
Meet Les Phryges! We have the Olympic Phryge (Phryge Olympique) and the Paralympic Phryge (Phryge Paralympique). They are hats–but not just any hat. They are Phrygian caps, which is a symbol of revolution and freedom. These revolutionaries want to ignite the world of sport and get more people active!
What can you tell me about the torch relay and the cauldron?
The Olympic torch relay, a Games element since the Berlin 1936 Olympics, brings the flame from Olympia, Greece–the Games ancestral home–to the host city.
At Paris 2024, Frenchman Mathieu Lehanneur designed the torch. This torch was a surprisingly light symmetrical shape that incorporated wave-like designs. The waves reflected the centrality of the Seine to the people of Paris and the water surrounding the many islands that comprise French overseas territories.
Lehanneur also designed the torch relay cauldron, where the flame went on display in various cities along the route:
Per tradition, the torch relay started in Olympia, Greece, using a back-up flame, as it was too cloudy to create a flame from the sun. The torch then traveled through Greece for about a week before embarking on a journey across the Mediterranean on a massive tall ship called the Belem. It docked in Marseilles and began its journey through France.
The relay traveled through most French departments, as well as around the world to visit some French territories, including French Guiana, Martinique, New Caledonia, Reunion, and French Polynesia, host of the Paris 2024 surfing competition.
The flame culminated its journey at the Opening Ceremonies, where French athletes Teddy Riner and Marie-Jose Perec lit the cauldron.
The cauldron, another design by Mathieu Lehanneur, resembled a hot air balloon carrying a nearly seven-meter ring of “fire” (which wasn’t actually fire but an electric flame made of water and light). The balloon was in tribute to the Frenchmen who invented the hot air balloon in the late 1700s.
During the day, the cauldron was on the ground in the Jardin des Tuileries and became an extremely popular tourist attraction. At sunset, it rose in the sky where it could be seen throughout the city.
The Paralympic torch relay started in Stoke Mandelville, England, the home of the Paralympic movement. Because these Games were so close to the Olympics, the torch relay was a bit shorter. The flame was after the Olympic Closing Ceremonies, then it was split into 12 different flames so that it can better span the country during its four-day relay from August 25-28. All told, the Paralympic flames visited 50 cities–and Jill saw it come through the Paris Media Centre.
The 12 flames converged in Paris and came together to light the Paralympic cauldron, the same hot air balloon cauldron.
At the Opening Ceremonies, five French athletes lit the Paralympic cauldron: Alexis Hanquinquant, Nantenin Keita, Charles-Antoine Kouakou, Elodie Lorandi and Fabien Lamirault.
What is the story behind the medals?
Designed by French jewelry company Chaumet, the medals are uniquely Parisian. The front of both the Olympic and Paralympic medals include a piece of iron from the original Eiffel Tower in a distinct hexagon.
The front side of the medals. Source: Paris 2024.
The reverse of the Olympic medal features the goddess Nike emerging from the Panathenaic Stadium, the site of the first Modern Olympics in 1896. On the reverse of the Paralympic medal, braille letters spell out Paris 2024 and show a low-angle view of the Eiffel Tower. The ribbons of both (red for Paralympics, blue for Olympics) feature a repeating pattern reminiscent of the arms of the Eiffel Tower.
Reverse of the Olympic medal. Source: Paris 2024
Did athletes really swim in the Seine?
The River Seine runs through the heart of Paris and is a treasured landmark of the city. At the Paris 2024 Games it took center stage–and not always in a good way.
Paris 2024 organizers decided that to spur a long-planned clean-up of the river (in 1990, President Jacques Chirac announced a plan to do so, but it went nowhere) it would play a major part in the Games.
First, the Seine was the stage for the Opening Ceremonies. Athletes paraded in boats down the river, performances took place on and along different sections of the river, and the protocol elements took place at the Trocadero.
During the Olympics, the Seine was the venue for triathlon and marathon swimming. For the Paralympics, it was the venue for para triathlon. There were still issues with water quality–if it rained, then the river quickly became too contaminated to swim in. Of course, it rained during both the Olympics and Paralympics, so events were moved; however, they actually happened.
The quality of the water may have been mixed–three German swimmers became ill after the open water swimming race, although it wasn’t for sure due to the water quality.
Another not-so-well talked about factor in the controversy over using the Seine as a venue was the fact that the current was very fast, so swimming downstream was not difficult, but the reverse trip proved to be very tough. Swimmers clung to the side wall as they attempted to avoid the worst of the current.