Visiting Athens, Greece, site of first Modern Olympic Games

Part 2 will visit Marathon and the original starting line of the famed 40km run (now 42.195km) to Athens, and Part 3 will visit Ancient Olympia.

If you are going to Athens, then as a Track & Field fan you must visit the original the Panathenaic Stadium, site of the 1896 Olympic Games.

Here are some logistics I will cover in this summary:

entry
workout
stadium
super curve track, and a slight downhill!
the warm up & Call room area, now a hidden museum
What the entrance to the stadium would have felt like (video)

Acropolis & Panathenaic Stadium museum 700 — View of Acropolis at Panathenaic Stadium

Entry

Back in 2022, it was €10 per person, and €1 to use the bathroom just next to the stadium. As of 2025, it is €12 per person, and €1.50 to use the bathroom. Full details are here.

Can I Workout in the Stadium?

The answer is yes, but don’t expect to run PB’s for 200m. See more about the curve below.

Morning Jogging is permitted from 07:30 until 09:00, and they say you must fill out a waiver form. I filled out mine, in Greek, with the help of Google translate, but the ticket booth or security guard didn’t ask for it.

The Stadium

What can I say? Wow. Still intact. Unlike the 1996 Atlanta Olympics, or even the 2004 Olympics in Athens! (We won’t talk about the state of the Montreal 1976 stadium!)

Made of marble, 29,400 cubic meters or 85.1 Million tons!

Other than 1896, it was used for the finish line for the 2004 Olympic Marathon as well as Archery.

Today, it is the finish line for the annual Authentic Marathon every November, which starts at the Battle of Marathon (more later on this in another post)

Jimson at Panathenaic Stadium — First place at Panathenaic Stadium

The Curve

Yes, the curve. And the straightaways are slightly downhill too!

The official track dimensions quotes 191m in length and 34m wide for the entire track. One lap of the track is 400m.

The unit stadion (plural stadia) is also anglicized as stade, which is 600 Ancient Greek feet (podes). The exact conversion varies, but this track had a straightaway of 178m which means the curve is 22m! On an indoor track, 50m-50m is normal, I’ve seen very ‘fat’ indoor tracks like Lee Valley (40-60?) and ‘skinny’ tracks like Cardiff (60-40?). So a 22m curve is very steep. Lane 1 or Lane 6, it’s all bad!

When you consider Thomas Burke won the 400m in 56.2 (58.4 in the heats), his PB was 48.5 on a standard track. That curve will slow you down!

The (Hidden) Museum

The entrance is located opposite the Finish line, or the “1500m start line”. It’s also included in the price on admission.

This used to be the locker room or changing room for the athletes, and doubled as the Call Room. Here, you can see posters and Olympic torches used in past Olympiads, among other memorabilia.

Entering the Stadium (what it felt like)

Imagine you were competing in 1896… this is what it would it would feel like as you leave the call room and enter the stadium! (I added the sound for effects)