As summer approaches, all eyes turn to Beijing for that quadrennial celebration of international athleticism, the Games of the XXIX Olympiad. USC Trojan Family Magazine offers this 100 percent statistics-free quiz to help get you into the spirit.

1. Noting an uncanny similarity between pushcart racing and this winter Olympic sport, a Virginia businessman, now mayor of an idyllic Washington, D.C., suburb, set in motion the unlikely series of events that pitched a tropical island nation into the international spotlight at Calgary.

2. The whimsical episode (above) was made into a popular 1993 movie by a USC alum.

3. At the Stockholm Games in 1912, these athletes became the first two Trojans to win  gold. Over the years, 39 more Trojans have followed suit – the most recent being this hurdler at the 2004 Athens games.

4. He is credited with launching two scouting organizations, and in 1976, a Soviet astronomer named a planet after him. But this French aristocrat is undoubtedly best remembered for his role in reviving the ancient Olympic tradition.

5. This Cary Grant movie set in the hustle and bustle of the Toyko Olympics features a young American athlete who, out of mild embarrassment, keeps his sport a secret. This little-celebrated, physically grueling event remains a staple of the summer games.

6. The daughter of Polish Jewish immigrants, this USC law student struck silver in Amsterdam and gold in Berlin, where – along with Jesse Owens – she had the pleasure of personally disproving Adolf Hitler’s theories concerning the superiority of the Aryan race.

7. Around the same time, a German Jewish athlete – and future Trojan – made history with the foil. She had won gold for Germany in Amsterdam, but failed to medal four years later in Los Angeles. Learning she’d been cut from her hometown fencing club under race laws, she opted to stay in L.A. and enroll at USC. She made her comeback in 1936, winning silver in Berlin.

8. In August, more than 10,000 athletes from 202 nations will descend on Beijing to compete in 28 Olympic sports. Make that 25 sports. Competitions in sailing, soccer and one other sport will not take place in the capital city. Due to “major difficulties in establishing a disease-free zone,” this third sport won’t even be held on the Chinese mainland: It will be hosted by a neighboring territory that traditionally sends its own delegation to the games.

9. Participation in the ancient games was strictly men only, but legend tells of a Spartan princess who, in 396 and again in 392 B.C.E., won victories in chariot racing. (The olive wreath was awarded to the horse breeder, not the driver.) Archeologists digging at Olympia have discovered a marble fragment inscribed with her name, which literally means “puppy.”

10. Speaking of olive wreaths, the ancient Greeks had a name for this sylvan crown bestowed on champions. In 2004, the tradition was renewed, and this seven-letter classical word gained new currency.   

11. With the high-water mark set in 1908 (when it bagged 56 gold medals), this is the only nation to have taken at least one gold medal at every summer Olympics since the modern games were established in 1894.

›› CONTEST RULES 
We are looking for the athletes, organizers, sports and random Olympic trivia referenced in each of these 11 clues. Some clues require more than one answer. Up to five $30 gift certificates from Borders Books and Music will be awarded to the swiftest, highest, strongest and best informed. If more than five perfect entries are received, five winners will be drawn by lot.

Send your answers by no later than June 15 to The Last Word c/o USC Trojan Family Magazine, University of Southern California, Los Angeles, CA 90089-7790.

Submissions by fax (213-821-1100) and e-mail <magazines@usc.edu> are welcome.