The men's 800 metres at the 2024 Summer Olympics was held in four rounds at the Stade de France in Paris, France, between 7 and 10 August 2024. This was the 30th time that the men's 800 metres was contested at the Summer Olympics. A total of 48 athletes were able to qualify for the event by entry standard or ranking.
Summary
None of the previous Olympic podium returned. Emmanuel Korir had won in 2021 and also the 2022 World Championships, which marked a changing of the guard for this event. Silver in 2022 was Djamel Sedjati, while Marco Arop took bronze. Arop won in 2023 in a slow race after getting the jump on Emmanuel Wanyonyi and the field on the backstretch. Wanyonyi closed for second, Ben Pattison got third. Sedjati came in as the World Leader, but the development of that had several significant steps. At the Kenyan Olympic Trials at altitude in Nairobi, Wanyonyi won largely unchallenged by .8 of a second in 1:41.70, which made him then the #3 performer in history. A few weeks later, many contenders met at the 2024 Meeting de Paris. There Wanyonyi improved upon his time to 1:41.58 and finished second to Sedjati's 1:41.56, with Gabriel Tual close at 1:41.61, the first time three athletes broke 1:42 in the same race and they took over #3 through #5 on the all time list. Five days later, Sedjati improved to 1:41.46 at the 2024 Herculis meet in Monaco, with Mohamed Attaoui just missing 1:42 behind him.[2] This new generation was running fast.
The final started off with Max Burgin on the inside making up the stagger on the field early, reaching the break line first. Wanyonyi wanted the lead, accelerating from fifth at the break line to take the tangent to the turn with a clear lead. Tual followed, after being passed by Wanyonyi. to assume a position on Wanyonyi's shoulder, boxing Burgin. Hoppel came up behind Tual, the leaders held this positioning for 300 more metres until Tual tried to edge ahead of Wanyonyi on the final backstretch. From the last two position at the bell, Arop followed by Sedjati began to move forward on the outside while Burgin faded back. Arop had arrived at Hoppel as Wanyonyi sped up to shake Tual. It took the entire turn for Arop to get past Hoppel and arrive at Tual while running on the outside. By this point Wanyonyi had a two metre lead. Now everybody sprint the home stretch. The tall Arop gained a little ground on every step. Behind them, Hoppel and Sedjati were out in lane 2 and 3 running stride for stride past Tual. Then Sedjati surged ahead, Hoppel looking down at his legs trying to get them to move faster. As Arop closed down on Wanyonyi his progress seemed to stall. Wanyonyi leaned early for the line, Arop gave his best sprinter's lean for the line but didn't quite get there. Sedjati finished 2 metres back to take bronze from Hoppel by a metre.[3]
The winning margin, between winner Wanyonyi and 2023 World Champion Arop was 0.01 seconds, closer than any other men's 800 metres Olympic final, even closer than Dave Wottle's famous finish in 1972 vs Yevhen Arzhanov which was .03. Furthermore, four athletes; Wanyonyi, Arop, Sedjati, and Bryce Hoppel broke the 1:42 barrier in the same race, with Wanyonyi's winning time of 1:41.19 being 0.28 seconds off David Rudisha's 2012 world (and Olympic) record of 1:40.91. Wanyonyi became the #3 performer in history, Arop #4. Sedjati's better Monaco performance was demoted to #5 and Hoppel #7.
The race was run in a unique way for 800m, with Wanyonyi's first 400m being around 50.3 seconds, making his second around 50.9 seconds. Compared to Rudisha's world record splits of 49.28 and 51.63, Wanyonyi's splits were relatively even. Silver medalist Marco Arop's splits were in fact a negative split, with his first 400m being 51.1 and his second 400m being 50.1.
For the men's 800 metres event, the qualification period was between 1 July 2023 and 30 June 2024.[7] 48 athletes were able to qualify for the event, with a maximum of three athletes per nation, by running the entry standard of 1:44.70 seconds or faster or by their World Athletics Ranking for this event.[7]
Results
Heats
The heats were held on 7 August, and started at 11:55 (UTC+2) in the morning.[1]
