Polytechnic Marathon the event, and the Polytechnic Marathon was born. The first Polytechnic Marathon was held on 8 May 1909. Henry Barrett won, followed by Fred Lord, and Harry Green. As with the Olympic race, the start was at Windsor Castle and the course was 26 miles, 385 yards; this distance was adopted as the international standard for marathons in 1924. (The older Boston Marathon, founded in 1897, adopted the distance in 1924, but was slightly short for the first three years and was shorter still from 1951 to 1956.) Over the years, the route of the Poly Marathon varied. From 1909
Athletics at the 1904 Summer Olympics – Men's marathon research on "purposeful dehydration," even though dehydration is potentially fatal. The marathon ended with the worst ratio of entrants to finishers (14 of 32) and by far the slowest winning time, 3:28:45, almost 30 minutes slower than the second slowest winning time. These were the standing world and Olympic records (in hours) prior to the 1904 Summer Olympics. "(*)" Distance was also 40 kilometres The first to arrive at the finish line was American runner Fred Lorz, who had actually dropped out of the race after nine miles and hitched a ride back to the stadium in a car, waving