Shot Put, Men

The event was conducted at the Ancient Olympic stadium on the Peleponnesus, although the woman threw first and had the honor of the first competition there in over 1,600 years. Adam Nelson (USA) had placed second at the last three major meets – the 2000 Olympics, and the 2001 and 2003 World Championships – and he hoped to improve on that. He opened with 21.16 (69-5¼) in round one, which led. It would be his best throw, and in fact, his only fair throw, as he followed with five fouls. In second after the first round was Ukraine’s Yuriy Bilonoh with 21.15 (69-4¾), only one centimeter back. He repeated that mark in round two but could do no better, and still trailed Nelson until the final round. In the final round Nelson had a marginal foul of around 21.30 (69-10¾), and had to settle for his opening mark. Bilonoh then threw 21.16 (69-5¼) in the final round to tie Nelson, but his next best mark was better than Nelson’s, who had no next best mark. Thus Nelson was again in second place. Finally in 2005, he would stop that trend, winning the World Championships.

But Nelson would eventually do better. In 2012 the IOC re-tested the drug samples from the Athens Olympics. Bilonoh would be disqualified in December 2012 when his doping sample revealed the presence of oxandrolone metabolite, an anabolic steroid. In June 2013 the IOC re-classified the medals, awarding Nelson the gold medal, with the silver medal going to Joachim Olsen and the bronze to Manuel Martínez.