Highlights
Cyprus first sent a team to the Lake Placid 1980 Winter Olympic Games and then a team of 14 to the Moscow Summer Olympics Games in Moscow later in that year. They have not missed an Olympic Games since.
Their shooters have consistently achieved top-10 placings. Georgios AKHILLEOUS finished fifth in the men's skeet at the Beijing 2008 Olympic Games. He also carried his country's flag in the Opening Ceremony.
In athletics, long jumper Maria LAMBROU competed in three Olympic Games (1976, 1980 and 1988). Before 1980, Cypriot athletes participated as part of the Greece team. At the first Olympic Games of the modern era in Athens in 1896, Ioannes FRANGOUDES (born in Zakynthos but a native of Limassol) won the 25m rapid pistol.
He was also second in the three position rifle and third in men's free pistol. The first Cypriot woman to compete was sprinter and hurdler Dominitsa LANITOU KAVOUNIDOU, who ran for Greece in the 100m and 80m hurdles at the Berlin 1936 Olympic Games. She also took part in the London 1948 Olympic Games.
At the Munich 1972 Olympic Games, Stavros TZIORTIS GIORGIS finished sixth in the 400m hurdles final. Cyprus have yet to win a gold medal competing as an independent nation.
Anthem: Title
Ymnos eis tin Eleftherian (Ode to Freedom)
Anthem: Year of Induction
1960
Anthem: Composer
Music by Nikolaoa MANTZAROS, words by Dionysios SOLOMOS.
Official NOC name
Cyprus
IOC recognition date
1978
NOC President's name
Prof. Ouranios IOANNIDES
NOC General Secretary's name
General Charalambos LOTTAS
Year of first appearance in an Olympic Games
1980
Number of appearances in Olympic Games
9, including London 2012
