Jubilation for Vadlau/Mähr

22nd Olympic gold medal! The first was back in 1896

Lara Vadlau and Lukas Mähr followed in the footsteps of Paul Neumann, Austria's first Olympic champion, (small picture) and won gold.

(Bild: GEPA/ÖOC)

Celebrations for Austria's first gold medal at the 2024 Olympic Games! Sailors Lara Vadlau/Lukas Mähr became Olympic champions in the 470 class off Marseille. This is the 22nd gold for Red-White-Red at the Summer Games. Reason enough to remember the beginnings 128 years ago, when Paul Neumann became Austria's first Olympic champion. 

At the Athens Games on April 11, 1896, he won the 500 m freestyle race in 8:12.6 minutes ahead of the Greeks Antonios Pepanos and Eustathios Chorafas. This historic victory received little or no coverage in Austria's daily newspapers ...

Only worth a quatrain
The "Morgen-Presse", which was the first of three daily editions of the "Presse" to appear at 6 a.m., reported on Paul Neumann's victory on April 12, 1896 - presumably as the first Viennese newspaper to do so. But you have to search the newspaper very carefully to find a four-line report on page 5 under the title "The Olympic Games"; it is very hidden between an article "On the art of fencing" and reports from "Theater and Art" and "Courtroom". The full text: "Athens, April 11. (Corr.-Ber.) Hajos (Hungary) came first in the 200-meter swim, Paul Neumann (Vienna) in the 500-meter swim, and Hajos (Hungary) in the 1200-meter swim."

Quatrain about the Olympic victory

(Bild: „Morgen-Presse“, 12. April 1896, ÖNB/ANNO)

The Pester Lloyd, which was able to report two domestic victories in Athens with Hajos, also published this report (without reference to the Olympics!) in three and a half lines, and the "Wiener Zeitung" and the "Neue Wiener Journal" also published such short reports on April 12, 1896. The fact that these reports were not about a 200 m competition, but about a 100 m race, should only be noted in passing.

"Winner statue in swimming costume"
In the "Neue Freie Presse", not to be confused with the aforementioned "Presse", which was published in parallel until October 31, 1896, there was a somewhat longer report from Athens, but also quite hidden on page 5 in the "Kleine Chronik". This newspaper even acknowledged "Mr. Paul Neumann" as the winner of the "World Swimming Championships" under the title "An Olympic Champion from Vienna". He had swum the distance of 500 meters in 8 minutes 12 seconds. Paul Neumann is described as follows: "The Olympic champion is a son of the Viennese professor of dermatology, Hofrath's Dr. Isidor Neumann. He is now 21 years old. Paul Neumann, who developed a very special mastery in swimming from childhood, is a student of the well-known Vöslau swimming champion Trautl. He is a sixth-year medical student and enjoys great popularity in student circles... His colleagues can now erect an Olympic champion statue of him in a swimming costume."

Paul Neumann, Austria's first Olympic champion

(Bild: ÖOC)

"Concurrent 100 meters back"
The Viennese "Allgemeine Sport-Zeitung" (ASZ), Austria's leading sports newspaper for decades, also had to make do with an eight-line short report on April 19 about Hajos' two Olympic victories and Neumann's success. On the other hand, the "ASZ" reported in detail from Athens after the return of the Austrian participants on April 26, 1896. In an article about the "Swimming competition at the Olympic Games" it said about Austria's first Olympic champion: "The 500 meter swim turned out to be a great victory for Paul Neumann. He left his Greek competitors about 100 meters behind. His time was 8:12. He was greeted with cheers, as he was the first Austrian to win at the Olympic Games."

Swimming competitions at the 1896 Olympics

(Bild: IOC)

The reports on the swimming competitions in 1896 in the "Official Report" of these games are exciting to read: "They were favored by the weather, which is why countless spectators from Athens came. The bay of Zea in Piraeus, which is very picturesquely situated at the most beautiful point of the city, forms a fairly shallow and waveless lake, which is connected to the sea by a narrow opening." Although 20 swimmers had registered for the 500 m competition, "only three took part, including two Greeks and one Austrian. The starting point is outside the bay, where the competitors are transported by steam launch. The first to arrive at the finish was the Austrian Neumann, with the Austrian flag flying from the mast, greeted by the audience. He covered the distance in 8' 12'' ¾."

"Only slowly accustomed to salt water"
Paul Neumann (1875 - 1932) later recalled: "We were generally slow to get used to salt water, as it was very hard on our eyes... We were taken by boat to the launch site - a rope held by boats. The start went quite well and we headed for the finish, which also consisted of a rope held down by boats. The swell made it impossible to have a real competition, as you couldn't see your rivals, and there was nothing to do but head for the finish as quickly as possible and wait for the result. ... I told myself in advance that I had to win at this classic venue. I arrived at the finish quite fresh and went to my pull-out cabin. I could already see the Austrian flag flying on the mast and heard the well-known Austrian national anthem... From then on I was a well-known person in Athens."

Silver medal for the winner
As is well known, the winners at the first Games of the modern era did not receive a gold medal but, as Olympic expert Volker Kluge writes, "a silver medal in a small box, a diploma in a blue and white roll and an olive branch cut from the Sacred Grove of Olympia".

The medals for the 1896 Olympics

(Bild: IOC)

Paul Neumann's success was undoubtedly aided by the fact that the Hungarian Alfréd Hajós, who had won the 100 m freestyle shortly before (and would later go on to win the 1200 m), was unable to compete in the 500 m event due to exhaustion. Otto Herschmann finished second behind Hajós in the 100 m freestyle. As I reported here three days ago, Herschmann was only third according to the "Official Report". A highly controversial decision, which the IOC revised in the summer of 2012 and allowed Herschmann to move up from third to second place in the medal table. Eustathios Chorafas, who had been in second place for over a century, no longer appears in the new results. The Greek did not reach the target, the IOC said today.