Sri Lanka, April 11 -- The 1912 Summer Olympic Games, officially known as the Games of the V Olympiad, were held in Stockholm, Sweden, between May 5 and July 22, 1912. The Stockholm Games were a model of efficiency. The Swedish hosts introduced the first Olympic use of automatic timing devices for the track events, the photo finish and a public address system.

If there was an unofficial theme of the 1912 Games, it was endurance. The course for the cycling road race was 320km, the longest race of any kind in Olympic history. In Greco-Roman wrestling, the middleweight semi-final match between Russian Martin Klein and Finland's Alfred Asikainen lasted 11 hours and 40 minutes.

It was the last time that solid gold medals were given out. The ...