Greatest Olympian

[Bazile]

Obviously Bolt is , for a lot of people .

Who is your choice , and why ?.

[trt]

Phelps.

[vulcan42]

Going back a bit here but my choice is an American Ray Ewry. He won 10 gold medals, 8 in the olympics and 2 in the intercalated games.
In 1900 at the Paris games he won 3 gold medals on the one day and repeated this again in 1904 at St Louis.

[Unsureme]

Jesse Owens.

[-Talbot-]

IMO this is something that cannot be answered. I believe in a list of greats but not the greatest.

[jim360]

By any sensible measure Michael Phelps ought to be at least in the top two. Most Medals overall, most gold medals, most individual medals overall, most individual gold medals, and dominant over four Olympic Games. Also these have come at several different swimming disciplines across the distances from 100m to 400m.

Bolt's victories are perhaps more memorable as I think there's a general bias in favour of athletics. I don't think I'll ever forget his wonderful run at the 2008 100m final, when he stopped racing after about 85 metres and still broke the world record with clear air between him and the rest of the field.

[AB Editor]

Bolt tops the list for me, for reasons nicely illustrated by Jim.

I've seen the women's track cycling team set some WRs, and it's something that's stuck with me. Maybe Laura Trott deserves a place somewhere at the table.

[-Talbot-]

Carl Lewis would surely be above Bolt?

Which is why I think I am right in what I said in my first post.

[PankySmooch]

Daley Thompson, did a lot more than just riding a bike and swimming

[jim360]

Thanks AB-Ed, although if anything I was trying to illustrate the opposite. But never mind :P

[Bazile]

Is this the one ( Mr 15 to 1) jim360 ?

[Bazile]

[Bazile]

Well , i tried

[-Talbot-]

Like a true Olympian, Bazile ... well done.

[Bazile]

lol talbot

[vulcan42]

Of course, Talbot is right, a list of greats is better. The problem is we're not comparing like with like, how can you compare a 100 metre gold with a marathon gold? I thought Ewry was special as he won 3 golds on the ONE day and repeated it four years later.

[jno]

you can pick a greatest by asking yourself who you'd most like to see. I think Jesse Owens for me.

[lankeela]

I think Mo Farah falling over and still winning takes some beating!

[jackthehat]

Hey....surely this chaps endeavours without benefit of the stop-watch or water-stations deserve a mention...?

[jackthehat]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pheidippides