THE Olympic Games celebrates herculean spirit as much as athletic brilliance and the event has come to symbolise mankind’s triumph over adversity.

The origin of the Games traces back some 3,000 years when the Greek soldier Pheidippides ran non-stop over 25 miles from Marathon to Athens to deliver the victory battle news over the Persians in 490 BC. ‘We have won,’ he is reported to have said before dropping dead of exertion.