Flanagan’s fantasy finish
Canadian ends collegiate career with ‘race of his life’
They set the sky-high target over coffee on Wednesday morning.
Hours before Canada’s Ben Flanagan stepped up to the start line at Hayward Field for the race of his life, he and coach Kevin Sullivan decided a victory in the NCAA men’s 10,000 metres was within reach. Sitting in a Eugene, Ore., coffee shop, they drew up their race plan accordingly.
Hours later, the 23-year-old from Kitchener, Ont., charged down the final straightaway to win gold with a spectacular kick, victorious in the final race of his collegiate career.
“It’s cool in hindsight because it was a lofty goal for sure and the best part of that moment was, I said ‘I think I can win this thing,’ and (Sullivan, a three-time Olympian for Canada) goes ‘Yeah, I think you can, too,’” Flanagan said Thursday morning.
“That was just a huge motivation for me to hear that much belief from an athlete who’s done it himself. That was step one, getting in the right mindset. And Sully’s a legendary racer, so I take every single word he says as gold when it comes to race strategy. He said, ‘When I raced, my goal was to never take the lead until I knew I was going to win.”’
Flanagan, a fifth-year senior for the University of Michigan, executed the race plan perfectly, patiently hunting down Alabama’s Vincent Kiprop before passing him on the home stretch in a thrilling finish that had social media buzzing. He crossed the line arms spread, his mustached mouth stretched in a wide grin.
Still talking a mile-a-minute the morning after, Flanagan said if he was in striking distance of gold, he wasn’t going to settle for less.
“I was running as hard as I possibly could,” Flanagan said, recounting the final few thrilling seconds. “And when I started accelerating, it was one of the coolest moments in my entire life, because the Hayward Field crowd just got so into it, and that really fuelled me that last 50 metres. When they got that excited it was like, ‘Oh my gosh, this is really happening.’
“As I got close, it was just this disbelief that slowly transitioned into this amazing feeling of, ‘Wow, I’m really going to do it.’ And in the moment there was nobody in front of me, I just saw the finish line, it was just the biggest ‘oh my god’ moment. Just pure genuine shock and disbelief, and excitement. It was such an emotionally overwhelming moment for me. I don’t know if I’ll ever be able to replicate a feeling like that again.”
The delightful seconds that followed made Flanagan an instant fan favourite. He looked into the infield camera that was streaming live to the stadium’s giant video screen and said: “Where’s my mom? Where’s my mom? Mom!”
Michelle Flanagan, an emergency room nurse practitioner, was thrilled to be trackside for the race.
“I was screaming the whole race,” she said with a laugh. “I’m not usually an in-your-face sports mom. I kind of sit back a little bit, but it was very exciting.”
Flanagan won in a time of 28 minutes 34.53 seconds, a personal best by almost a minute. He blew away his previous best finish at NCAA nationals: 14th in 2016.
And his big breakthrough came after he missed major chunks of the last couple of seasons with what Sullivan called “horrendous” injuries, first a stress fracture in his back, then a foot injury this spring.
Focused on the gruelling NCAA season for five years, Flanagan would like to race at the Canadian championships next month in Ottawa.