One of the oldest footraces in North American is the Boston Marathon. The race was inspired by the 1896 Olympic marathon conceived by Michel Breal, a French classicist and historian, who insisted that the athletic program of the first modern Olympic Games must include an endurance footrace. He suggested a forty-kilometer race to celebrate the feat of Pheidippides, a Greek soldier who ran that distance from Marathon to Athens to announce the Greek triumph over Persia in 490 B C Spiridon Louis, a Greek shepherd, won the 1896 Olympic marathon in less than three hours. After the Olympic Games the Boston Athletic Association decided to hold a similar race to commemorate the famous ride of Paul Revere on the eve of the American Revolution. The first race was held on 19 April 1897, In conjunction with the BAA handicap track meet The race followed a 24.7 -mile course...