Hicham El Guerrouj wins the 1500m Olympic title in Athens (© Getty Images)
In the second part of their eight edition review of the highlights of the 2004 Athletics year, A. Lennart Julin and Mirko Jalava survey the middle distance events.
Men – Middle Distance
800m
The 800m is probably the least predictable event at the moment. It appears that there is currently a group of some twenty athletes capable of beating each other on any given day. Just look at the story from the seasonal peak in the period, early August to early September.
In the last major pre-Olympic encounter in Zürich, the B-race had the trio Youssef Saad Kamel, Amine Laalou and Antonio Reina finishing in 1:43.11-1:43.89, and in the A-race the Wilfred Bungei, William Yiampoy, Joseph Mutua and Wilson Kipketer ran 1:43.06-1:43.89, with a certain Mulaudzi in 9th place in 1:46.89.
In the Olympics, Kamel was eliminated in the first round and Mutua, Reina and Lalou in the semis. The finishing order in the final was 1) Borzakovskiy 1:44.45, 2) Mulaudzi, 3) Kipketer, 4) Mohcine Chehibi, 5) Bungei, 6) Hezekiel Sepeng, 7) Djabir Said-Guerni, 8) Ismail Ahmed Ismail. No one would have predicted that group of finalists (Ismail has yet to dip under 1:45 and Chehibi had 1:45.73 as his PB prior to Athens!).
Then the athletes went back to the circuit for further re-shuffling:
Brussels: 1) Bungei 1:43.48, 2) Yiampoy 1:43.50, 3) Mutua, 4) Kamel, 5) Said-Guerni, 6) Bram Som, 7) Mulaudzi, … 9) Kipketer, 10) Reina, 11) Sepeng.
Rieti: 1) Mutua 1:43.35, 2) Kamel 1:43.43, 3) Kipketer 1:43.89, 4) Som, …. 10) Reina, … dnf Laalou, Yiampoy
Berlin: 1) Kamel 1:45.07, 2) Bungei, 3) Som, 4) Yiampoy, 5) Mutua, 6) Laalou, 7) Chehibi
WAF: 1) Kamel 1:45.91, 2) Mutua, 3) Som, 4) Bungei, 5) Mulaudzi, 6) Kipketer, 7) Laalou.
The conclusion can only be that the great depth at the 1:44-level is there but that truly outstanding athletes are currently missing. The most consistent were Borzakovskiy (but only ran seven meets) and Bungei but also they had their ups and downs.
This situation is at the same time the perfect setting for a quickly rising star to take advantage of in a similar way as Wilson Kipketer did in 1994, when he went from the middle-of-the-pack to the very top to stay there for several years. Of the younger runners of today perhaps Youssef Saad Kamel – with the great Konchellah 800m genes – seems to have the greatest potential to return the event to the consistent sub-1:43 levels.
800m - IAAF WORLD RANKINGS - as of 13 Dec 2004
Position - Name - DOB - Country - Points
1. Yuriy BORZAKOVSKIY 81 RUS 1360
2. Wilfred BUNGEI 80 KEN 1352
3. William YIAMPOY 74 KEN 1337
4. Youssef Saad KAMEL 83 BRN 1326
5. Joseph Mwengi MUTUA 78 KEN 1323
6. Mbulaeni MULAUDZI 80 RSA 1322
7. Wilson KIPKETER 72 DEN 1321
8. Hezekiel SEPENG 74 RSA 1301
1500m
2004 statistically became an historic year, as for the first time since 1995 the name Hicham El Guerrouj was not heading the year list! But he probably didn’t mind that very much as he instead finally got that illusive Olympic gold medal. And he still prolonged his sub-3:30 streak to nine years via his 3:27.64 when narrowly beaten in Zürich by Bernard Lagat.
In depth, 2004 reached new heights with nine sub-3:31 and no less than 24 sub 3:33 runs. In the years 1997-2003 these numbers were quite stable averaging 6.3 and 15.9, so the improvement was considerable (close to 50%).
The bulk of the top runners still are provided by Kenya (6 of top 10) but noticeable was both the resurgence of Algeria with three at 3:32, as well as the sudden emergence of completely new names on the world 1500m scene like Rashid Ramzi and Mulugeta Wondimu. The latter might become Ethiopia’s first ever star performer at this distance, although he became a 1500m runner more or less by default halfway through the summer, when realising he would not get on the Ethiopian Olympic 5000m team he switched to the event.
Although the event is still very much dominated by African runners there were encouraging signs for the future also for Europe (Ivan Heshko & Rui Silva 3:30, Mehdi Baala 3:31, Michael East, Alvaro Fernandez, Juan Carlos Higuero and Mounir Yemmouni 3:32) for Oceania (Nick Willis 3:32) and for the USA (Alan Webb 3:32). Yemmouni, Willis and Webb were all born 1983 and improved four seconds or more which indicates exciting potential.
1500m - IAAF WORLD RANKINGS - as of 13 Dec 2004
Position - Name - DOB - Country - Points
1. Bernard LAGAT 74 KEN 1401
2. Timothy KIPTANUI 80 KEN 1356
3. Paul KORIR 77 KEN 1346
4. Ivan HESHKO 79 UKR 1343
5. Hicham EL GUERROUJ 74 MAR 1341
6. Alex KIPCHIRCHIR 84 KEN 1329
7. Isaac Kiprono SONGOK 84 KEN 1321
8. Rui SILVA 77 POR 1318
WOMEN - Middle Distance
Things changed a lot in the middle distances during 2004. With Maria Mutola’s (MOZ) almost two-year-old win streak in the 800m coming to an end in Lausanne, where she lost to Svetlana Cherkasova. There was also a new queen to be crowned at the middle distances in Athens. 34-year-old Kelly Holmes (GBR) was victorious in both 800m and 1500m in Athens following her 800m silver in the Paris World Championships a year before. Holmes has come a long way from Sydney where she took the bronze medal in 800m, and was seventh in 1500m.
800m
Although Holmes only raced five times (once indoors) during 2004, she won all of her races. She won the national championships both indoors and outdoors, and raced only once abroad before the Olympics in the 800m winning in 1:58.71 in San Sebastian, Spain, in July. But her form in Athens was solid, she won her heats in all of the three rounds, first recording a season’s best of 1:57.98 in the semi-final and then winning the Olympic gold medal with the second best mark of her career, 1:56.38. Her personal best of 1:56.21 dates back to the Grand Prix Final in Monaco in September 1995!
Just looking at the world list, 800m was a very even event at the top this season. There were a total of six women at 1:56.59 or better, but Tatyana Andrianova’s (RUS) world leading time of 1:56.23 from the national championships in July is only 0.46 better than the sixth place in the world list.
Maria Mutola, the reigning World champion from Paris 2003, came to the season unbeaten since the Commonwealth Games in July 2002. But her win streak came to an end after 27 races in Lausanne on July 6, where she was beaten by Svetlana Cherkasova. The Russian, however, did not make the final in Athens, where Mutola, despite leading in the beginning of the final straight, finally faded to fourth place, still recording a season’s best of 1:56.51 in easily the most even 800m Olympic final ever.
This was the first time when the first five in a competition finished on the same second, in fact only 0.13 seconds was between the gold medallist Holmes and fourth placer Mutola. Hasna Benhassi (MAR) was second in 1:56.43, a national record, and Jolanda Ceplak (SLO) took the bronze in 1:56.43, and world leader Andrianova was fifth in 1:56.88.
The overall quality went up as well and was better than in the Olympic year of 2000 too, there were 35 athletes under two minutes, in 2003 and 2002 we had 25, 26 in 2001 and 31 in 2000. Russia had 19 athletes in the world top-100, USA had eight and Romania six.
800m - IAAF WORLD RANKINGS - as of 13 Dec 2004
Position - Name - DOB - Country - Points
1. Maria de Lurdes MUTOLA 72 MOZ 1365
2. Jolanda ÈEPLAK 76 SLO 1349
3. Hasna BENHASSI 78 MAR 1321
4. Jearl MILES−CLARK 66 USA 1309
5. Kelly HOLMES 70 GBR 1301
6. Tatyana ANDRIANOVA 79 RUS 1299
7. Svetlana CHERKASOVA 78 RUS 1279
8. Mina AIT HAMMOU 78 MAR 1276
1500m
In the 1500m, Elvan Abeylegesse (TUR) started her season with an early world lead of 3:58.28 at the end of May, which lasted until the Olympic Games final. Abeylegesse, however, didn’t play a big part in the incredibly high standard Olympic final where she clocked 4:00.67, but that was only enough for the eighth place. This was easily the best mark for eighth place in the Olympics.
During the summer, there were several athletes recording relatively fast times, but in the end no-one in particular entered the Games as a favourite.
Unlike in the 800m, Kelly Holmes raced internationally in the 1500m before Athens. After finishing a disappointing ninth in the World Indoor Championships in Budapest she was in the top three in all of her six outdoor races before Athens. Although she only entered the Olympics with a season’s best of 4:03.48 from Zürich Weltklasse, she won the gold medal with a national record of 3:57.90. Tatyana Tomashova (RUS) took the silver medal with 3:58.12, and Maria Cioncan (ROM) was third in 3:58.39.
There were a total of seven performances under four minutes during this season with six of them coming in the Olympic final. In 2004 there were only 23 athletes under 4:04, one less than the 24 in 2003. In 2002 and 2001 there were 16 and the Olympic year of 2000 had 23 as well. Russia had 15 athletes in the world top-100, USA had 12, and Morocco, 7.
1500m - IAAF WORLD RANKINGS - as of 13 Dec 2004
Position - Name - DOB - Country - Points
1. Kelly HOLMES 70 GBR 1356
2. Tatyana TOMASHOVA 75 RUS 1351
3. Yelena ZADOROZHNAYA 77 RUS 1308
4. Olga YEGOROVA 72 RUS 1306
4. Lidia CHOJECKA−OKNIÑSKA 77 POL 1306
6. Natalya YEVDOKIMOVA 78 RUS 1300
7. Carmen DOUMA−HUSSAR 77 CAN 1292
8. Hayley PARRY−TULLETT 73 GBR 1280