Hassan’s piece of history

When the customary medallists’ press conference for the women’s 10,000m took place in Paris, one of the top three was missing.

Sifan Hassan, who had won bronze in the race to add to the one of the same colour she had captured in the 5000m, could be excused. She still had work to do.

As the press conference wound down, the 10,000m champion Beatrice Chebet and silver medallist Nadia Battocletti were asked how they might feel if they still had a marathon to run, with only one day to recover. Their slightly nervous, slightly bewildered laughter at the very thought told its own story.

But that was the assignment Hassan had given herself. She had contested the 1500m, 5000m and 10,000m at the Tokyo Games – an itinerary that had raised more than the odd eyebrow – but swapping in the marathon this time seemed to most like an act of sheer folly. For the first half of her 26.2-mile journey on the final day of the athletics competition, the Dutchwoman concurred.

Sifan Hassan (Getty)

“Every moment I was regretting that I had run the 5000m and 10,000m,” she said. “I was telling myself: ‘If I hadn’t done that, I would feel great today’. From the beginning to the end, it was so hard. Every step of the way I was thinking: ‘Why did I do that? What is wrong with me?’.”

Yet, from around the 20km mark, the tide began to turn and the fact that Hassan finished first in a closing sprint to the line with Ethiopian world record-holder Tigist Assefa was simultaneously jaw-dropping yet not at all surprising.

Deploying the speed that made her a world 1500m champion in 2019, as well as using some good old fashioned brute force as she and Assefa clashed elbows when the Ethiopian appeared to attempt to block her rival, Hassan produced a spectacularly fitting finale for these Games.

Sifan Hassan and Tigist Assefa (Getty)

The last athlete to win medals in the 5000m, 10,000m and marathon in a single Games was Emil Zatopek in 1952 and, after breaking the Olympic record with 2:22:55 over the most challenging of courses to win by just three seconds, the 31-year-old had carved out her own slice of history.

“When I finished, the whole moment was a release,” said Hassan, who had covered a total racing distance of 62km during Paris 2024. “It is unbelievable. I have never experienced anything like that. Even the other marathons I have run were not close to this.

“When I finished, I couldn’t stop celebrating. I was feeling dizzy. I wanted to lie down. Then I thought, ‘I am the Olympic champion. How is this possible?’. I was scared of this race. At the end I thought, ‘This is just a 100m sprint. Come on, Sifan. One more. Just feel it, like someone who sprints 200m’.”

» This article first appeared in the September issue of AW magazine. Subscribe to AW magazine here, check out our new podcast here or sign up to our digital archive of back issues from 1945 to the present day here