Day 8: 3000m T, Mar, 4x100m, 4x400m, DT, 10kmRW

Albin Stenroos, who had already hung up his spikes once, got back into running training in the autumn of 1923. At the age of 35, he arrived in Paris and broke away from the pack even before reaching the halfway point. He secured a dominant victory with a six-minute lead. Antwerp Olympic champion Hannes Kolehmainen did not finish.

Kolehmainen's formidable rival from the Antwerp Games, Jüri Lossman of Estonia, fought his way to the 10th position this time.

The Finnish coaching staff undoubtedly made a clever tactical move by concealing Stenroos's Olympic form during the spring trials. Foreign competitors may not have taken the man's breakaway entirely seriously on the streets of Paris until it was too late.

In Finland, the marathon victory was celebrated in traditional fashion. In Helsinki, a crowd of ten thousand people or more roamed the streets until midnight, singing patriotic songs.

Audiovisuals

• Film (IOC)

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Newspaper and Online Stories

• Albin Stenroos (Finnish Olympic Committee, in Finnish)

• Local newspaper article about Stenroos (in Finnish)

Finnish long-distance runners continued their celebration with the 3000-meter team race, where the team of Nurmi-Ritola-Katz-S. Tala-Liewendahl claimed the victory.

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Have you ever heard of the Italian race walker Ugo Frigerio? Not many people have, even though he is one of the all-time best in his event.

In Paris, he repeated his Antwerp Olympic gold in the 10-kilometre track walk. The victory came in overwhelming fashion, as the silver medalist, Gordon Goodwin of Britain, was left half a lap behind. Frigerio, who was born in Naples in 1901, might have stepped onto the winners' podium in the 3-kilometre track walk as well, had the event not been dropped from the programme between the Antwerp and Paris Olympic Games.

Race walking was not appreciated in Finland in the 1920s. The Finnish press dismissed the news of Frigerio's victory with a shrug. The International Olympic Committee (IOC) also showed no sympathy after the judging controversies at the Paris Games, leading to the complete removal of race walking from the Amsterdam Games. Frigerio retired from the sport at the same time. When race walking was reinstated into the Los Angeles Games programme in the form of the 50-kilometre road walk, Frigerio was motivated to return. He crowned his career by still winning a bronze medal at the 1932 Olympic Games.

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• Ugo Frigerio, triple Olympic Gold Medalist (VRWC)

Bud Houser of America became a double winner, as this Californian powerhouse, who later in life became a dentist for Hollywood actors, also took the gold in the discus throw. Vilho Niittymaa of Finland, struggling with a hand injury, secured second place.

Houser withstood the pressure of being the favourite, while compatriot Glenn Hartranft in the shadows. The South Dakotan claimed the sixth position with a throw of 42.5 metres (139ft), while the cake had travelled over 48 metres (157ft) in American spring.

Experienced veterans Elmer Niklander, 34, and Armas Taipale, 33, took the 7th and 12th places, labelled disappointments in the Finnish camp. Both old Olympic champions stated after the Paris Games that they had had enough and tossed the bun into the bushes. Taipale moved to America, and Niklander retired to his farm in Oitti, southern Finland. 

Houser renewed his discus Olympic gold four years later in Amsterdam, once again defeating a Finn, whose name this time was Antero Kivi.

Results and Reports

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