How red wine fuelled 1924 Olympic marathon runners

Isotonic drinks and glucose gels will be the usual mid-race fare for marathon competitors at the Paris Olympics this year, but the standard refreshment for runners at the Games 100 years ago was somewhat different - large glasses of red wine.

The film of the 1924 Olympics in the French capital - the Games that was also the subject of the 1981 film Chariots of

Fire - has been colourised by artificial intelligence through technology driven by Alibaba AI, an Olympic sponsor, with some startling results about the marathon, which was run in searing summer heat.

Michael Payne, the IOC's former marketing director who has been involved in the project, said: “We got hold of the original 1924 film and proceeded to colourise it with AI technology, and so for the first time you can actually see what the runners are being served when they stop at the drink points on the marathon.

“It has all come out in the colourisation and you see the runners knocking back glasses of red wine at the drinks stand. This has not been hacked or someone playing with the narrative - it really is remarkable.”

Sports nutritionists do not dismiss the positive effects of claret or Burgundy on long-distance athletes entirely.

James Ellis, an ultra-marathon runner and captain of the 2021 British Spartathlon team, runs James Ellis Nutrition. “Drinking red wine during a race might seem a little less bizarre when you consider that it's packed with polyphenols that can supercharge mitochondria, the body's energy cells, and help tame inflammation,” he said.

“But it’s also true that alcohol impairs muscle growth, dehydrates the body, depletes energy and can slow reaction times. That is why these days you never see the likes of Mo Farah downing malbec instead of a specialist sports drink.

“Curiously there's still a race that honours that 1924 tradition, though. The Marathon du Medoc in the Gironde has taken it to the next level, replacing regular water stops with 23 wine tastings. It’s the only race where you might finish with more ‘body’ and considerably less ‘legs’ than you started with.”

It is not clear whether the 1924 marathon winner, Albin Stenroos, of Finland who was 35 at the time, chose the red wine option. The film also shows runners drinking and dowsing themselves from communal water buckets.

The use of red wine as a stimulant was pretty tame by the standards of the day.

That same year, the three Pelissier brothers quit the Tour de France cycling race - Henri was the defending champion - in protest at the organisers, and gave an interview to the French reporter, Albert Londres, revealing they were fuelled by various substances including strychnine, cocaine and nitroglycerine. “We ride on dynamite,” Henri said, 80 years before the Lance Armstrong scandal.

The IOC hopes to have the whole film restored in time for this year’s Games.

"It will allow you to experience the history of the Chariots of Fire Olympics through a whole new dynamic,” Payne said.

“The IOC is also putting forward a kind of ‘white paper’ on the future of AI in sport, the opportunities and the threats, and to try to connect all the dots.”

“This has not been hacked or someone playing with the narrative - it really is remarkable.” Michael Payne, IOC