Who is the richest sportsman in the history of the world? (

So, allowing for inflation and 'index linking' over the ages etc who's the riuchest sportsman of all time?

Well, you could suggest Tiger Woods, with a net worth of over $1bn. It would be a good shout IMO.

Or, failing that, Michael Schumacher, whose personal fortune is greater than E500million.

But you'd be wrong by a long way.

A roman charioteer, named Gaius Appuleius Diocles, amassed a fortune 35,863,120 sesterces in prize money – the equivalent of $15 billion (£9.6 billion), claims Peter Struck, a professor of classical studies.

Doubtless, had the likes of Nike been around in the 2nd century, the hero, noted as the “champion of all charioteers”, would have been markedly better off still.

The extent of his riches is recorded on a monumental inscription erected in Rome in 146AD by his fellow charioteers and fans.

Prof Struck, from the University of Chicago, calculated that Diocles’s wealth would have been enough to fund the entire Roman Army for more than two months at the height of its imperial reach.

“By today’s standards that last figure, assuming the apt comparison is what it takes to pay the wages of the American armed forces for the same period, would cash out to about $15 billion,” said Prof Struck.

And I bet he never had the scandal Tiger does.