Modern pentathlon at the Summer Olympics Modern pentathlon at the Summer Olympics Modern pentathlon is a sports contest created especially for the Summer Olympic Games by the founder of the modern Games, Baron Pierre de Coubertin, and was first contested in 1912. Coubertin was inspired by the pentathlon event in Ancient Olympic Games, which was modeled after the skills of the ideal soldier at the time. The "modern" pentathlon simulates the experience of a 19th-century cavalry soldier behind enemy lines: he/she must ride an unfamiliar horse, fight with pistol and sword, swim, and run. Therefore, the modern pentathlon event comprises the five sport disciplines: Modern pentathlon
Olympic Games ceremony the host nation's flag bringing up the rear. Behind them march all of the athletes without any distinction or grouping by nationality. This "Parade of Athletes," the blending of all the athletes, is a tradition that began during the 1956 Summer Olympics at the suggestion of Melbourne schoolboy John Ian Wing, who thought it would be a way of bringing the athletes of the world together as "one nation." Prior to the 1956 Games, no Olympic Team had ever marched in the closing ceremony of the Modern or the Ancient Games. It was the very first International Peace March ever