( CNN ) -- Moments have defined the Olympic Games as much as individual accomplishments . Take a look at 10 snapshots in time that transcended sport and have become a part of history . Cathy Freeman in 2000 : Australia 's pride lights up Sydney with a golden smile . Freeman lights up Sydney : At the time , the 2000 Summer Games in Sydney , Australia , were declared the best Olympics ever . One performer , host country 's Cathy Freeman , stood above all other athletes . ( Full story ) Dark cloud over sprinting : 1988 was the moment when athletics lost its innocence . Canadian Ben Johnson 's showdown against Carl Lewis in the 100-meter sprint turned into a headline-dominating doping scandal and a national disgrace for Canada . ( Full story ) Budd v. Decker : Maricica Puica of Romania won the women 's 3,000 meters final in Los Angeles in 1984 . But everyone watching the race went away speaking of American Mary Decker and South African Zola Budd . ( Full story ) Munich : In the early hours of September 5 , 1972 , there would have seemed nothing immediately untoward about the sight of nine men , wearing tracksuits and carrying sports bags emblazoned with the Olympic rings , demonstrating their athletic prowess by scaling the walls around the athletes ' compound . ( Full story ) Beamon 's leap : Few feats can compare with the record-shattering leap that won American Bob Beamon the long jump gold medal in Mexico City in 1968 . ( Full story ) Black power : Of all the many occasions on which the Games have been used as a stage for political dissent , however , few , if any , were as powerful or eloquent as the moment at the 1968 Mexico City Olympics when Tommie Smith and John Carlos stood on the winner 's podium and gave a Black Power salute in protest at continued racial oppression in their native United States . ( Full story ) Bikila 's triumph : The fact that modern long distance running is so closely associated with athletes of east African origin is largely due to Abebe Bikila 's pioneering success in Rome in 1960 . ( Full story ) Owens at Berlin : In the history of the modern Olympics few , if any , performances have captured the popular imagination in quite the same way as that of American Jesse Owens at the 1936 Berlin Games . ( Full story ) 1956 : Blood in the water : Hungary 's water polo semifinal against the Soviet Union in Melbourne in 1956 may be unrivaled in the political symbolism it carried . ( Full story ) Falling short in 1908 : Among the many memorable moments associated with the Olympic marathon , none are more infamous than Dorando Pietri 's failure to win the race in London in 1908 . ( Full story )
Olympic moments often involve sport , with political overtones . Modern Olympics have seen violence , suffered from terrorism . Olympics often provide athletes stage to air attacks on society .