A truly international field for the first time was made to run just one
preliminary round, with the result that only the winners of eight heats
would qualify. Emilio Lunghi ran an excellent 4:03.8 in heat 3 - the
second best time in the heats, but finished behind Hallows, whose time
of 4:03.4 was an Olympic record. The unfortunate Italian thus failed to
qualify. Sheppard had set an Olympic record of 4:05.0 in the preceding
heat, just beating his countryman John Halstead (4:05.2e), another vic-
tim of the rigorous qualification procedures.
In the final, Fairbairn-Crawford set the pace for 500m, and then
Loney took over, but slowed the tempo down. The rhythm was little
changed after Hallows took the lead, and only increased with 300m to
go when Wilson made his big effort. Into the finishing straight Wilson
led from Hallows, with Sheppard third, but the US 800m champion
was too quick for the diminutive (1.63/52kg) Briton and won by one
and a half metres. Deakin, the fourth Briton home, was still running
cross-country in his eighties.
United States
Great Britain
Canada
France
Norway
Hungary
Netherlands
ANZ
Denmark
GeR
Italy
Sweden
Greece
Finland
Belgium
Canada
