Hoplitodromos

The hoplitodromos (or hoplitodromia) was an ancient foot race, part of the Olympic Games and the other Panhellenic Games. It was the last foot race to be added to the Olympics, first appearing at the 65th Olympics in 520 BC, and was traditionally the last foot race to be held.cite book|title=Sport and Recreation in Ancient Greece: A Sourcebook with Translations|last=Sweet|first=Waldo Earle|date=1987|pages=149|publisher=Oxford University Press|isbn=0195041267|url=http://books.google.com/books?id=irS26JvDzVwC&pg=PA149&ots=XIGli6qa-r&sig=EanJdgomCXtccYMIlGfRFhqKpTU#PPA31,M1]

Unlike the other races, which were generally run in the nude, the "hoplitodromos" required competitors to run wearing the helmet and greaves of the hoplite infantryman from which the race took its name. Runners also carried the "aspis", the hoplites' bronze-covered wood shield, bringing the total encumbrance to at least 50 pounds. As the "hoplitodromos" was one of the shorter foot races, the heavy armor and shield was less a test of endurance than one of sheer muscular strength. After 450 BC, the use of greaves was abandoned; however, the weight of the shield and helmet remained substantial.cite book|title=Marathon 490 BC: The First Persian Invasion of Greece|first=Nick|last=Sekunda|date=2002|isbn=1841760005|publisher=Osprey Publishing|pages=65|url=http://books.google.com/books?id=pDACy7M7NHoC&pg=PA65&sig=dT0sFUaEDSbaJgjQdMQKpbL-EKk]

At Olympia and Athens, the "hoplitodromos" track, like that of the "diaulos", was a single lap of the stadium (or two "stades"). Since the track made a hairpin turn at the end of the stadium, there was a turning post called a "kampter" at each end of the track to assist the sprinters in negotiating the tight turn — a task complicated by the shield carried in the runner's off hand. At Nemea the distance was doubled to four "stades", and at Plataia in Boeotia the race was 15 "stades" in total.

The "hoplitodromos", with its military accoutrements, was as much a military training exercise as an athletic contest. Encounters with squads of expert Persian archers, first occurring shortly before the "hoplitodromos" was introduced in 520 BC, must have suggested the need for training the Greek armored infantry in fast "rushing" maneuvers during combat. Additionally, the original 400-meter length of the "hoplitodromos" coincides well with the effective area of the Persian archers' zone of fire, suggesting an explicit military purpose for this type of training.cite book|title=Greek Hoplite, 480-330 BC|last=Sekunda|first=Nick|otherauthors=Adam Hook|year=2000|publisher=Osprey Publishing|pages=6|isbn=1855328674|url=http://books.google.com/books?id=OBsUFB0ZLJYC&pg=PA6&sig=E-QoshHUgaZUJEK7nzjSwFF2v9I#PPA6,M1] cite journal|title=The Bowshot and Marathon|journal=Journal of Hellenic Studies|issue=90|pages=197–198|date=1970]

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