Who is the flukiest Olympic Gold medal winner of all-time?

And yet Wolde followed that up with a WC 5000m Silver the next year so he clearly was a gamer.

Track Historian wrote:

Maybe not the flukiest, but up there as a fluke or not very interesting is Million Wolde in the 5k at Sydney in 2000.

It was a pretty uninteresting field, in a slow time, and he did not do much else in his career. A 12:59 personal best is not that impressive for an Olympic champion in 2000.

I will forever believe that it may be the most forgettable 5000m final in recent Olympic history.

Wolde took silver in 5000m one year later at the WC in Edmonton though.

Jttr wrote:

Artojas wrote:

He indeed ran under 1:44 for 5 consecutive years, you're right.

Nonetheless, that 1500m gold was indeed lucky, because he "only" got bronze in his main event - 800m.

Also Andre Bucher comes to mind, as well as Ramil Guliyev, Konstantinos Kenteris and Kim Collins

These were all great runners, but without a huge legacy or an impressive medal count. Just did the right thing at the right time and nobody else happen to do it better on that particular day.

Being an 800m runner who followed the sport closely, I take issue with listing Bucher. He had won Monaco in a season leading 1:42.9 going into the World Champs and was the favorite to win.

I guess you're right. Still to note, that many 800m gold winners kinda built "a dynasty" and Bucher just wasn't one of those guys. No other medals in olympics or WC.

Tron wrote:

slippy wrote:

Well, in the case of Steven Bradbury, it did.

hah...yup, should have been eliminated in the early rounds and kept on getting lucky with people falling/DQs in front of him

Here's the race. Bradbury admits that he was probably the 8th best skater in the field. He was 15m off the pace on the last lap when the 4 guys ahead of him crashed.

The shoulders on that Greek lady are really something. Athletes from the steroid era look extremely obvious in hindsight

Artojas wrote:

Jttr wrote:

Being an 800m runner who followed the sport closely, I take issue with listing Bucher. He had won Monaco in a season leading 1:42.9 going into the World Champs and was the favorite to win.

I guess you're right. Still to note, that many 800m gold winners kinda built "a dynasty" and Bucher just wasn't one of those guys. No other medals in olympics or WC.

Yeah, i suppose it is fair that he didn't amass many accolades in other years despite coming close, but he was great in 2001.

Working Stiff wrote:

The shoulders on that Greek lady are really something. Athletes from the steroid era look extremely obvious in hindsight

Pretty noticeable, isn't it. I am fairly sure she and Kederis were both exposed for PEDs a few years later. I wonder if she tested on her son?

Opinionated guy wrote:

Working Stiff wrote:

The shoulders on that Greek lady are really something. Athletes from the steroid era look extremely obvious in hindsight

Pretty noticeable, isn't it. I am fairly sure she and Kederis were both exposed for PEDs a few years later. I wonder if she tested on her son?

It was Kenteris and Thanou for missed doping tests - during their home OG 2004 in Athens.

Ridiculous story with a made up motorcycle accident and dramatic hospitalization.

just a guy being a dude wrote:

How about Wilfred Bungui in the 2008 800? I'm too young to know much about him - was he the real deal? Wikipedia says he won a world silver 7 years before in '01, and a world bronze in '03. Was he injured alot or just the most inconsistent runner ever? What's his story.

SBs:

‘00 - 1:44.23

‘01 - 1:42.96

‘02 - 1:42.34

‘03 - 1:42.52

‘04 - 1:43.06

‘05 - 1:43.70

‘06 - 1:43.31

‘07 - 1:44.14

‘08 - 1:44.63

T&F News World Rankings:

‘01 - 5

‘02 - 6

‘03 - 1

‘04 - 2

‘05 - 1

‘06 - 3

‘07 - 4

‘08 - 2

In other words, no, he was neither oft-injured nor inconsistent.

OriginalLurker wrote:

It was Kenteris and Thanou for missed doping tests - during their home OG 2004 in Athens.

Ridiculous story with a made up motorcycle accident and dramatic hospitalization.

I knew it was something crazy enough that I called it "exposed."

Thanks for spelling it out. I am good at throwing out a thought and waiting for you much smarter people to help it to make sense.

I went through just about every middle and long distance runner mentioned in this thread and found their ultimate peak position on the all-time lists in the event in which they won gold:

Billy Mills - 2

Fermin Cacho - 3

Eliud Kipchoge - 4

Ron Delany - 5

Vebjorn Rodal - 5

Andre Bucher - 5

Yuriy Borzakovskiy - 5

Wilfred Bungei - 5

Emma Coburn - 6

Naftali Temu - 7

Amos Biwott - 8

Steve Ovett - 8

Stefano Baldini - 11

Million Wolde - 17

Matt Centrowitz - 40

Peter Rono - 47

Yusuf Saad Kamel - 58

Nils Schumann - 84

Interesting stuff JWH but I am not sure how good of a barometer this is regarding the topic, as I am sure you’d agree. It could potentially penalize fast finishers such as Mo Farah, Eamonn Coughlan and Alberto Cova, for example, who surely would not rank high on that list.

I guess I gave Eamonn Coghlan an extra vowel above, but he did run 13:19 in 1981 before getting a WC gold in 1983. I imagine Cova and Farah might not rank high nor would Khalid Skah who could finish fast.

True, it’s obviously not a conclusive metric, only food for thought. I do think it goes a long way toward dispelling the notion that some of these guys were big flukes—like in the case of the series of #5 800m runners. I had thought of Farah, who peaked at 25 (5k) and 14 (10k) and was clearly the furthest thing from a fluke. I also think it does a disservice to Kamel, since 1:42.79 800 speed is pretty useful in a championship 1500.

Yes it is still a useful stat and does indeed mislead, as you suggested, regarding runners like Kamel who did use his sub 1:43 speed to great advantage in that 1500m. He did defeat Lagat, who was still a pretty good runner then, in that race. Does anyone remember Matthew Birir? Birir won gold over Patrick Sang in 1992 and he did get 4th in 1996 but his lifetime best was 8:08.

fisky wrote:

Tron wrote:

hah...yup, should have been eliminated in the early rounds and kept on getting lucky with people falling/DQs in front of him

Here's the race. Bradbury admits that he was probably the 8th best skater in the field. He was 15m off the pace on the last lap when the 4 guys ahead of him crashed.

He's an absolute legend in Australia, whose name has gone permanently into Australian vernacular.

Anyone pulling off anything unlikely, in sport or anywhere else, is said to have "Done a Bradbury".

As soon as I read the title I was like, I feel like this was posted to focus on Centro and I was right someone responded with Centro in the beginning of this thread. Lol some of you guys are OBSESSED with him and try to get validation by talking about him on here or on ig lol. I'm a fan but dang you guys think about him wayyyy more than I do. But yes like the people are saying Centro is a 3:30 runner with a world championship silver and bronze and indoor gold before that. He's a very very smart racer and not really a time trialer. He's not a fluke. A fluke would have been a 3:33/3:34 runner who has never medaled in any international championships or have never won nationals.

Shhhh wrote:

As soon as I read the title I was like, I feel like this was posted to focus on Centro and I was right someone responded with Centro in the beginning of this thread. Lol some of you guys are OBSESSED with him and try to get validation by talking about him on here or on ig lol. I'm a fan but dang you guys think about him wayyyy more than I do. But yes like the people are saying Centro is a 3:30 runner with a world championship silver and bronze and indoor gold before that. He's a very very smart racer and not really a time trialer. He's not a fluke. A fluke would have been a 3:33/3:34 runner who has never medaled in any international championships or have never won nationals.

And he was 4th in the 2012 Olympic 1500. Anyone who thinks that his was a fluke win knows nothing about track and field.

My vote goes to Nouria Mérah-Benida, the women's 1500m winner from 2000, never even ran in the semi-finals in any other major meet. She ran the heats in the 800 in 1996, didn't make it out of the heats in the 1500 at the 1999 Worlds, and then was the last semi-final qualifier in the 1500 in the 2001 Worlds but didn't run the semis.

How about Tiki Gelana, the 2012 women's marathon winner? No other medals in any other major championship and her only other big win was Rotterdam in 2012. Jemima Sumgong will only have the one gold from the 2016 Marathon but she won London and finished second at NY, Boston, and Chicago. Some others are Xing Huina who won the 10000 in 2004 and has no other major medals but was 5th in the 5000 and 4th in the 10000 in the 2005 Worlds. Fani Chalkia of Greece won the 400m hurdles in 2004 in Athens, setting an Olympic record in the semis, and her only other major medal is a silver from the 2006 European Championships.

Some of the runners mentioned on this thread (like Kenteris and Centro) have medals in the World Championships so I'm not sure how you can consider them flukes. The four most recent flukes are Peter Rono, Voula Patoulidou, and Mérah-Benida.