When Bernard Lagat lined up to start the 5,000 meters at Hayward Field on Saturday, he did not know that 13:35.50 minutes later that he would be an Olympian for the fifth time; he only hoped.
The 41-year-old Lagat took first with a 52 second final lap, and at the end of the race he stuck his tongue out, widened his eyes in excitement and embraced his family.
“My daughter tells me, ‘daddy, I want you to make [the Olympics] so I can watch gymnastics,’” Lagat said at the press conference. “I made my daughters day today, so I am happy with that.”
In the 2000 Summer Olympics in Sydney, Australia, Lagat represented Kenya when he won the bronze in the 1,500. He began competing for the United States in 2005 and he will have another chance to bring a medal to the States.
After Lagat failed to qualify for Rio in the 10k, some questioned his age entering this race.
“That did not settle in my head,” Lagat said, “I was concentrating and racing hard to make sure that I made the team, and I knew my competitors would not rule me out.”
Within the 5k race itself Lagat may have bee ruled out. Lagat stayed in the pack until the final 400 meters, where he kicked into another gear. In the final 100, he burst from the fourth position, and with the roar of the Hayward crowd that knows him so well, he took first.
Lagat has been running at Hayward field since his freshman year at Washington State in 1998, and has gone on to set Ameican records in the 1,500 and 5k since.
“These are the same people who saw me run in college,” Lagat said. “You develop a certain relationship with people, so when I did not run well at the Prefontaine Classic… I did not want that to be the last image that people saw… [and] in a way that helped me concentrate more.”
Hassan Mead of Nike Oregon Track Club Elite finished second in 13:35.70, and Paul Chelimo of the U.S. Army stole the third and final Olympic qualifying spot with a late kick. Nike Oregon Project’s Eric Jenkins finished fourth in 13:35.98, just six hundredths of a second behind Chelimo.
After taking control late in the race, Nike Oregon Project’s Galen Rupp would finish ninth.
Rupp was already qualified in both the 10k and the marathon, and if he qualified in the 5k he would’ve chosen between that and the marathon.
Rupp stayed with the pack until four laps to go when he began to separate. He entered the final lap with a 20 meter lead, but at the final 300 meters he was passed and he kept falling back from there. He finished with a time of 13:41.09.
“I thought it would be better to leave it to not a wild sprint,” Rupp told reporters. “I went for it. It didn’t workout today, but that is the way it goes. Sometimes you die.”
Rupp has been doing grueling work to prepare himself for a possible marathon and 10k at Rio, and that affected him.
“I was definitely still a little tired out there,” Rupp said. ” Where I am at with my training, I am still happy with how things went this week. I’ve been hitting the long stuff a lot for the last couple of months. We knew that my speed wasn’t great here, and I think this just kind of proved that.”
As for the decision to run in the 5k or the marathon, Rupp said it best: “I took care of that decision.”
Follow Jack Butler on Twitter @Butler917