Marathon and Olympic History

Against all odds, a Greek marathon runner is going to be able to compete in the London Olympics.

This seems particularly touching because Greece is the birthplace of the marathon.

The back story of the marathon comes during the Persian Wars.  The Persian soldiers fought the Athens city-state at Marathon, leaving the actual city-state unprotected (check on how far it is betweens Marathon and Athens).  Athens won the fight and then sent Pheidippides, a fast runner, ahead to run to Athens and deliver the news that they had defeated the Persians.  This was so that Athens would not give up the city to the Persians if attacked before the Athenian soldiers could return.  Pheidippides made the run, announced their victory to the Athenians and then died.

When the first modern Olympics was being prepared for in 1896 in Athens, they wanted a way to popularize the Olympics (get people excited about it).  They decided to include the marathon event (the official marathon distance had been slightly tweaked over time and became 26.2) for men.  The first time the Olympics held a women's marathon was in 1984 in Los Angeles.

Traditionally, the marathon is the last event of the Olympics and it typically ends with the finish line in the Olympic Stadium.

So having a greek woman run in the marathon race is not only appropriate, but important/special.
For more information about the original Olympics, wikipedia has a great page on it. Go here.