American Cole Hocker pulls off Olympic stunner for the ages in 1,500 meters

Cole Hocker of the United States celebrates after winning the men’s 1500 meters at the Paris Olympics in Stade de France. (AP Photo/Petr David Josek)

Cole Hocker of the United States celebrates after winning the men’s 1,500-meters final at the Summer Olympics on Tuesday, Aug. 6, 2024, in Saint-Denis, France. (AP Photo/David J. Phillip)
Hocker burst through an opening on the rail left by Ingebrigtsen, either out of sloppy race management or sheer disrespect, to record the most improbable victory of this meet, and maybe these entire Olympics.

His time of 3 minutes, 27.65 seconds is an Olympic record and a personal best by a guy who had never cracked 3:30. Kerr needed to out-lean American Yared Nuguse for the silver by one-hundredth of a second, but that still meant a pair U.S. medals in track’s iconic middle distance race for the first time since, gulp, 1912.

It is the second 1,500 gold by an American man in the last three Olympics, but the other was from Matthew Centrowitz in 2016 in 3:50.00, a bizarre race in which the finalists jogged around the track until a mad dash for the line and had the slowest winning time since 1932.

The first lap that night was 66.83. Tuesday, Ingebrigtsen took it out in 54.82.

That was expected, since Kerr has a better kick and the Norwegian wanted to take the sting out of his legs with a blistering pace. What wasn’t expected was he would take it out that fast.

“It was at least two seconds too fast,” said Ingebrigtsen, who was fourth and, incredibly, off the podium. “I was thinking about slowing down, but the next lap was almost the same speed. I ruined it for myself by going way too hard.

“I can only blame myself. It’s a difficult game, balancing your energy.”

Kerr knew it was coming and went with him.

“Just expect one of the most vicious, hardest 1,500 meters that the sport has seen in a very long time,” he had predicted after Sunday’s semifinals.

Cole Hocker of Team United States celebrates winning the gold medal after the Men’s 1500m Final during the Athletics on day eleven of the Olympic Games Paris 2024 at Stade de France on Aug. 06, 2024 in Paris, France. (Photo by Maja Hitij/Getty Images)
Hocker went with him, too. So did Nuguse and Hobbs Kessler in the first Olympic 1,500 final with three U.S. runners since 1968.

Hocker was in fifth at the bell lap, 10 meters back of the charging Ingebrigtsen. He surged with 300 meters to go and moved into third, then tried to pull alongside Ingebrigtsen with 100 to go.

Then dropped back when there was no way through.

Then, somehow, somewhere, summoned reserves he probably didn’t know he had as a hole opened inside, extending his arms wide as he crossed the line first.

“I kind of told myself that I’m in this race, too,” Hocker said. “If they let me fly under the radar, then so be it. … I’m still searching for the words to describe that moment, but every part of me knew this was the Olympic final. I knew what I had left and I kind of knew I was going to get a medal.

“It was, ‘Let’s get silver,’ then ‘Let’s get gold,’ and with 10 meters to go I felt like I knew I had gold – insane. I feel like I’ve lived that scenario a lot of times in real life, racing people and trying to kick people down, and this time it just happened to be the Olympic final. I’m still trying to figure out how to comprehend that.”

So is everyone else.

As Hocker and his man bun celebrated, the incredulous British commentator on EuroSport TV screamed: “The upset of upsets has happened. Oh my word, the king is dead. The prince is now king. Hocker was one of those pretenders behind. He is one of the most unexpected champions. … Jakob Ingebrigtsen beaten, but not by the man that was expected, not by Josh Kerr. That was astonishing.”

Hocker had a distinguished prep career in Indianapolis and won the Foot Locker National Cross Country Championships on Balboa Park’s Morley Field course in 2018. He went to Oregon, then was sidetracked by the pandemic. He made the Olympic team three years ago and at 19 became the youngest American finalist in a half-century.

Still, he finished sixth. He was seventh at last year’s World Championships in Budapest, Hungary, watching Kerr and Ingebrigtsen battle ahead of him in an epic race despite clocking a personal-best 3:30.70.

Now, 3:27.65. Now, the Olympic record. Now, the gold medal.

Kerr’s time of 3:27.79 broke the British record … and was only good enough for silver.

“The fastest that I’ve ever run by almost two seconds,” he said. “It wasn’t enough today. That’s sport. I’m very proud of myself and my preparation coming in. I left no stones unturned and that’s the result today.”

The gold-bronze haul helped bolster the U.S. medal count on a day when no American men participated in the long jump final in a non-boycotted Olympics for only the second time in history. The count grew by two more in the women’s 200 meters when Harvard alum Gabby Scott pulled away from the field to win with Brittany Brown holding on for bronze by two-hundredths of a second.

Gabby Thomas reacts after winning the women’s 200 meters final at Stade de France on Tuesday. (AP Photo/Petr David Josek)
Thomas had been chasing this gold for six years and burst into tears as she pulled away from a diluted field.

The anticipated showdown with Jamaica’s Shericka Jackson, the second-fastest woman in history after Florence Griffith-Joyner, never materialized. Thomas was injured at last year’s worlds, and Jackson was injured here. So was Elaine Thompson Herah, the Tokyo gold medalist, marking the first time since 1976 that there has been a 200 final without a Jamaican woman.

The winning time of 21.81 is slower than the last three major global meets and would have got bronze in them. Jackson ran 21.41 and 21.45 to claim her last two world titles.

Thomas, though, isn’t complaining.

“I’ve envisioned this race over and over in my head so many times,” she said, “but I did not expect to feel how I felt when I crossed that line. You prepare for this moment, and you train so hard for this moment, but when it actually comes, it’s indescribable.

“I never would have imagined in my wildest dreams that I would become an Olympic gold medalist, and I am one. I’m still kind of wrapping my head around that. It’s the happiest moment of my life.”