Why the Games Run on a Four Year Cycle

The ancient Greeks measured time in Olympiads, four year spans between festivals at Olympia, so Pierre de Coubertin kept the rhythm when he revived the Games in 1896. The cycle proved so fixed that even world wars cancelled three editions without breaking the numbering: the 1916 Berlin Games never happened, yet Antwerp 1920 was still counted as the seventh Olympiad.

Only the COVID 19 pandemic has ever shifted the calendar, moving Tokyo 2020 to 2021, a full year late but still on paper the Games of the 32nd Olympiad. Since 1994 the Winter Games occupy their own slot, the even years between summer celebrations, doubling the rhythm to a two year Olympic pulse..