Team, Men

This event was somewhat like a scored gymnastics team exhibition, as teams could consist of between 16 and 40 gymnasts who performed voluntary mass exercises for up to 30 minutes. Despite that, the Great Britain roster contains 46 names. However, extensive research has failed to establish how many actually competed. It is further felt that some of the listed athletes were actually officials, who may well have competed and officiated at the same time.

Teams could score up to a maximum of 480 points. In this era, there was a battle over the best system of gymnastics to be used to promote health. The two main systems were the German turnverein system, promoted originally by Johannes Guts-Muths and Friedrich Ludwig Jahn, and the Swedish system of calisthenics and exercises, which was founded by Pehr Henrik Ling and was much less rigidly formatted. The 1908 team all-around was performed using the Swedish system, and it is not surprising that Sweden won the gold medal, nor that their Scandinavian neighbors, Norway and Finland, won the silver and bronze medal.