My Olympics Rankings: Athens No. 5

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BEIJING -- You would have thought, considering Greece was the birthplace of the Olympics, that the Athens Games would have been more special.

As it turned out, it was the idea of holding the Games in Greece that was special.

If the International Olympic Committee had thought it would have been otherwise, it would have granted the Games to Athens in the Centennial year of 1996. Instead, it gave those milestone Games to Atlanta.

Athens is one of the most wonderful places in the world to visit, except perhaps when a big event is in town. It was too crowded, too hot, too humid, too anxious and in too much of a hurry to get the whole thing over with before something tragic happened.

There had been those fears. Tension in the area was high because of the Iraq war, and security was extra vigilant because of terrorist threats. Our company, Tribune Co., hired a couple of British security experts who had worked in Northern Ireland to teach staffers who were going to Athens how to cope with an attack. I still have my gas mask.

As it turned out, I need it more in Beijing because of the air quality than I did in Athens. Nothing happened.

This is my ninth Summer Olympics, my sixth for the Los Angeles Times. I did my first two, in Montreal and Moscow, for the Chicago Sun-Times. I did 2004 in Athens for the Baltimore Sun. That was a memorable experience for me because we were the hometown paper for Michael Phelps, who was chasing -- as he is this year -- Mark Spitz’s record of seven gold medals in a single Summer Games.

When Phelps failed to win an early race, I’ll never forget how many of my sportswriting colleagues decided he was no longer a story. They deserted the swimming, most of them spending most of their time with an over-hyped, over-pampered men’s basketball team that finished third. Phelps, in the meantime, ended up winning six gold medals, which, call me a cheerleader, is still pretty good. Don’t you think?

The media were treated exceedingly well. There was a rooftop bar at the press center, which, like most rooftop bars in Athens, afforded spectacular views. I assume it closed at some point every morning. But you could stay as long as the bartender did, and, as far as I could tell, he never went home. My man.

Next: Moscow

-- Randy Harvey