PARIS, France — Rarely has an Olympic pin contained so much love.
When French runner Alice Finot got down on one knee and proposed to her boyfriend after her Olympic steeplechase race, she attached a “Love is in Paris” pin on his shirt.
“I told myself that if I ran under nine minutes, knowing that nine is my lucky number and that we’ve been together for nine years, then I would propose," Finot said.
Finot finished fourth in 8 minutes, 58.67 seconds on Tuesday and then ran over to the stands where she found her boyfriend, Spanish triathlete Bruno Martinez.
“I don’t like doing things like everyone else,” Finot said. “Since he hadn’t done it yet, I thought maybe it was up to me.”
Despite finishing fourth, Finot still broke the European steeplechase record, according to NBC, who posted video of the uniquely Olympic proposal to Facebook.
Pins have become a near ubiquitous symbol of the Games.
Paris has seen an influx of collectors from all over the world, each eager to begin or expand their Olympic pin collection and share their stories.
The tradition can be traced back to the first modern Olympic Games, revived by Pierre de Coubertin in 1896. In Athens, little cardboard badges were sported by athletes, coaches and reporters for identification.
More than a century on, the badges have stretched and evolved into extremely detailed, intricate and, at times, technological pins, customized to participating countries, news organizations, brands and even people.
“They’re like little pieces of art,” passionately declares Nicholas Wolaver, a dedicated American collector and trader.
After two Olympics held without spectators amid the coronavirus pandemic, the pin pandemonium has resurged.
“Paris has been very good for pin collecting because after the pandemic, where you could not trade pins so much in Tokyo and Beijing, people are very excited,” Wolaver explains.
The pins’ popularity has been boosted by social media and the fact that Olympians themselves are getting in on the game. Serena Williams, a former Olympian, described herself as a “first-class pin collector” in a video on the Olympics’ official Instagram account.
