Not infrequently, the most dramatic moments of the United States Olympic Team Trials for track and field have nothing to do with gold medals; rather, they are about bronze ones. A close race for first or second means little, because the top three from each event punch their tickets to the Games. A close race for third, however, will take two competitors separated by mere fractions of a second and divide them even further into newly minted Olympian and instantly forgotten also‑ran.
Even hard-core fans often forget that Carmelita Jeter won the women’s 100-metre final at the 2012 trials in Eugene, Oregon, for example. But most recall the battle for third between Allyson Felix and Jeneba Tarmoh. Both sprinters ran 11.07 seconds, and, despite that time being world-class, only one of them would head to London. Officials consulted Hayward Field’s state-of-the-art photo-finish system, a...
Alex Cyr is the author of Runners of the Nish: A Season in the Sun, Rain, Hail and Hell. He is trying to run faster than he did in university.
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