Sporting Witness
Sporting Witness
Vanderlei de Lima and the sabotaged Olympic marathon
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January 6, 2024
9 minutes
Available for over a year
In the 2004 Athens Olympics, Brazilian Vanderlei de Lima was leading the Men’s Marathon with six kilometres to go. What happened next shocked the millions of fans watching and propelled Vanderlei into becoming a universal role model for sportsmanship.
He relives those last kilometres with Uma Doraiswamy.
(Photo: Vanderlei de Lima being attacked by Cornelius Horan. Credit: Jiro Mochizuki/ AFP via Getty Images)