PARIS — One hundredth of a second.
That was it. That’s what separated Edmonton’s 800-metre man Marco Arop from Kenya’s Emmanuel Wanyonyi in the Olympic final on Saturday at Stade de France.
Arop, 25, finished with silver in 1:41.20, a North American record, to the Kenyan’s gold in 1:41.19, in as close a race as you are ever going to see. They duelled down the stretch and it was a lean. A forehead. An eyelash.
Arop, the 2023 world champ, started at the back as he often does. He was eighth at the bell and started to work his way through the field on the back stretch. But he never quite made it to the front, as he so often does. This time Wanyonyi, an Olympic rookie, had just enough to hold off the Canadian kid. Algeria’s Djamel Sedjati, the man with the fastest time this year, finished with bronze.