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Dwight Stones

The Olympic Games, or Olympics, is an international multi-sport event taking place every four years which comprises of summer and winter games. Though the first ancient games were held in 776 B.C, the modern games started from 1896.The unity of the 5 continents is shown on the Olympic flag by five colorful intertwined rings of red, blue, green, yellow, and black, created by Baron Pierre de Coubertin to represent atleast one color of the participating country’s national flag.

Dwight Stones was born on December 6, 1953 in Los Angeles, California. He is a television commentator and a two-time Olympic bronze medalist and former three-time world record holder in the men's high jump. Throughout his 16-year career, he won 19 national championships. In 1984, he became the first athlete to both compete and announce at the same Olympics. Stones set his first world record when he cleared 7 feet and 6 inches jump in 1973 at Munich, Germany. That jump also made him the first flop jumper to set a world high jump record, five years after Dick Fosbury made that jumping style famous while winning the Mexico City Olympics. Stones raised the world record to 7 feet 7 inches in 1976 and added another quarter inch to the record two months later.

Stones was one of the world’s top high jumpers from 1972 to 1984 and was twice named the World Indoor Athlete of the Year by Track and Field News. At age 18, Stones represented the United States for the first time at the 1972 Olympic Games and was placed third in the high jump competition. Four years after, Stones was forced to jump in the rain at Montreal and was the object of booing and abuse from the fans. He returned to the Olympics in 1984 and finished at fourth position after setting his 13th American record at that year's Trials.

For much of his career, Dwight Stones was affiliated with the Desert Oasis Track Club, of which he was the founder and lone member. In 1988, Stones was inducted into the USA Track and Field Hall of Fame. He never lost hope in himself and always fought hard to achieve his goal.

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