It was rated an all-round success by its organisers, the European Weightlifting Federation (EWF), and by the most decorated Olympic weightlifter Pyrros Dimas, general secretary of the Greek federation.

"To witness such an event in Olympia has been an overwhelming experience," Dimas said.

The EWF Cup for mixed gender teams was also a big hit with those who matter most - the 40 athletes who competed for the first time in a faster format of five-minute "windows" in snatch and clean and jerk.

They had a maximum of three attempts in those five minutes, and scores were calculated using Sinclair points.

"An excellent event and a good initiative for innovation in our sport," was the verdict from Forrester Osei, chair of the IWF Athletes' Commission and one of five IWF Board members who went to Olympia.

"All the athletes liked the idea of drawing teams from different countries.

"With all the historic scenery and nature around them it felt like being on holiday, but there was no holiday feel when it came to competition time. They all performed really well."

Multiple champion Loredana Toma from Romania and Marin Robu from Moldova, the top individual performers, put on a post-competition exhibition for the many spectators who watched, mostly tourists.

But the event was all about teamwork and togetherness, featuring teams named after ancient Greek cities.

Team Knossos - Toma and Lucas Muller from Germany - jointly scored 645.98 Sinclair points for first place and a prize of $4,000 (£3,301/€3,808).

Second place and $2,000 (£1,650/€1,904) went to Team Thiva, Atenery Hernandez from Spain and Artur Mugurdumov from Israel.

The $1,000 (£825/€952) prize for third place was won by Team Athina, Erin Barton from Britain and Ferdi Hardal from Turkey.

"Probably the biggest success of the event was the unity achieved among the participants," said EWF president Antonio Conflitti.

The Israeli super-heavyweight David Livinov, who said Olympia "felt like a holy place for sport", agreed. 

"In 15 years of weightlifting I’ve never felt anything like it," he said. 

"It was completely different to the World Championships in Saudi Arabia a month ago, my last competition.

"Usually you compete for yourself and your flag. In Olympia you were a team, when someone from another country does everything they can to help you lift more.

"We still need to develop the format more, but this can help us to look at a different approach to the sport.

"We need to find a mixed gender event for the 2028 Olympics - mixed events are something the IOC is striving for.

"I really believe it’s an important message the EWF is sending, by promoting something like this they show how we can develop the sport.

"Even after the competition we all talked a lot among ourselves about how much fun it was.

"It was good for the athletes as well as the sport. There was less stress, it was quicker, more like a game, an easier environment to compete in.

"The format we have had for the last century needs to change to make weightlifting more watchable, more understandable with simplified rules."

Litvinov was also involved in what may have been the first version of "street weightlifting", an outdoor international match between Israel and Iceland at Tel Aviv University in 2017.

"We were talking about that event a few days ago," Litvinov said.

"I think it was the first edition of urban weightlifting and we had a lot of interactions with people who stopped and asked about the sport. This is exactly what promotes weightlifting.

"If we can find a way to make it more interesting to a general audience everybody will benefit."

More recently, there have been innovative outdoor events in Switzerland, Cuba and Slovenia, with more planned next year.

EWF general secretary Milan Mihajlovic said, "The fact that some of the athletes rated the EWF Cup as a six on a scale of one to five exemplifies how they considered the event.

"See you next year."