Maria Polyzou – Sports Award
Maria Polyzou is the first Greek woman to compete in a road marathon at the Olympic Games in Atlanta in 1996. She was champion for twenty consecutive years and holder of the Greek record, in the marathon road, a record maintained to this day with 2:3:40. He holds the best Greek performance on the authentic Marathon-Athens route with a time of 2:39:10 from the 1997 World Championships, where he also took 12th place.
He holds the Panhellenic Record in the Half Marathon with a time of 1:13:31 since 1998. He won the First Balkan Gold Medal in a Marathon Road, scoring a Balkan Record by running in Istanbul in 1990. In her honor, the National Anthem was heard in the city. He shot down 14 Panhellenic Records at various distances. It has run a total of over 250,000 kilometers i.e. more than 5 times the round of the earth.
In July 2010 he repeated a feat of world history.
On the 2,500th anniversary of the Battle of Marathon, he ran the distance from Athens to Sparta, rested for an hour, and took, running again, the way back. In the Acropolis first and from there in the tomb of the fallen in Marathon. In seven days Maria traveled 524 km, a distance corresponding to about 13 marathons (42km). This is the Phidippideos Sport, and Maria Yozou is the only woman from antiquity to the present day who managed to repeat him.
In 2007 she contributed decisively to the creation of the Marathon Road Museum and was director for 4 years. She was named Ambassador of the Marathon Road in 2009.
At the official invitation of the organizers, he moved the flame of the Marathon Road from Marathon – the birthplace of the marathon road – to the following international marathons: Boston, Prague, Thiamen (China), Mumbai. He is the author of the book POWER AND BODY the chronicle of a 524 km feat, GREAT COUNTRY PUBLICATIONS and has given dozens of speeches on the values of sport and the marathon road he loves.
In 2012 he created MARATHON TEAM GREECE by Maria Polyzou and coaches people of all ages and supports them by coaching to experience their personal sport. He has supported coaching over 5,000 runners as well as large teams RUNNING TEAM of major companies.
Maria Matzou is a modern exampl
e of a Greek woman and not only for sport. He showed us that will, faith, ideals are kept alive and unchanged in modern Greece.
