Nurmi's 1928 10,000 Title His Ninth Olympic Gold

by Marc Bloom

The Race

In the 1920s, when sporting figures were heroes of a Golden Age, Paavo Nurmi was every bit the celebrity as a Babe Ruth or Charlie Chaplin. During one winter tour of the U.S., Nurmi won 53 of 55 races and was asked to meet President Calvin Coolidge. Nurmi was so overwhelming he could win multiple events within days, or hours. At the '24 Paris Olympics, Nurmi won the 10,000-meter cross-country event in 100-degree heat that forced 24 of the 39 starters to collapse unconscious. The next day, while many of those victims remained hospitalized, Nurmi won the 3,000-meter team event.

Nurmi went into the 1928 Games in Amsterdam with 8 Olympic gold medals already, and the first of his three events was the 10,000. Nurmi had been denied entry in the Paris 10,000 so that another Finn, Ville Ritola, could win, and he did, setting a world record of 30:23.2. Angered, Nurmi shattered that mark soon after in 30:06.2 (and was said to run sub-30 in training).

On the opening day of the 1928 Olympics, with 30,000 spectators filling the stadium, Nurmi lined up against Ritola in the 10,000. There were more than 20 men in the field, many from Scandanavia, the Rift Valley of its period. At Paris, every distance event, from the 1500 to the marathon, had been won by a Finn. No one doubted that a Finn would triumph again, but which one?

As the race got under way, Joie Ray, the American hope, was among the early leaders. But he was no match for the Flying Finns. After four laps, Nurmi and Ritola joined the front along with Edvin Wide of Sweden, the '24 silver medalist. Ray, who would place 5th in the marathon a week later, fell back and shortly before midway the Nurmi-Ritola-Wide trio took charge. The two Finns dropped Wide after 18 laps and then raced in tandem, a sight to behold as a New York Times dispatch described it: ".the pair doing such a perfect brother act that one could imagine them both part of the same smooth-running machine."

Nurmi and Ritola sustained their united effort to the bell lap, when Nurmi bolted ahead for a narrow victory, 30:18.8, an Olympic record, to Ritola's 30:19.4. Wide took the bronze in 31:00.8. "It's worth crossing the ocean just to see this," said Major Gen. MacArthur, President of the American Olympic Committee, as quoted in the Times.

Apparently still fuming from the 10,000 slight at Paris, Nurmi refused to shake Ritola's hand on the victory podium and walked off the track, ninth gold medal in hand, without a smile and shunning photographers. Nurmi, who set 25 world records in all, finally seemed at peace years later when he was chosen to carry the torch to open the 1952 Olympics in Helsinki. Taking the steps gracefully with the torch aloft, the 55-year-old Nurmi passed it to another former Finnish champion, Hannes Kolehmainen, who lit the flame. The athletes on the track broke ranks to see Nurmi close up, a man who ran like no other and was widely misunderstood.

Eyewitness: Matti Hannus, Journalist Who Knew Nurmi

August 4, 1928 in Amsterdam was a strange day for Paavo Nurmi. What he did not know--but may have secretly guessed-was that his Olympic career was over. After his third event of the Amsterdam Games, the 5,000 meters, in which he placed an exhausted second (collecting his 12th Olympic medal), Nurmi lay down on the infield grass and rested there, eyes closed. No one had ever seen Nurmi as a supplicant before.

Four years later at age 35 Nurmi still harbored hopes of running the marathon at the Los Angeles Olympics, winning the Finnish trial easily, but he was declared a professional for taking prize money by the international authorities and banned from the Games. It was said that this turn of events made Nurmi a bitter man. The tactiturn, solitary Nurmi did little to change that image. He just did not like talking very much.

However, a collection of letters by Nurmi to his friends and relatives revealed his warmth, at times of poetic dimension. Deprived as a child, Nurmi could sympathize with others. After his father died when he was 13, Nurmi worked to help support the family. He was the brightest student in school, a deep thinker with deep ambition.

Nurmi would make his fortune not from running but in the construction business. He gave financial assistance to running rival Ville Ritola, who'd defeated him in the Amsterdam 5,000. As late as 1972, by then critically ill, Nurmi sent advice to Lasse Viren and Pekka Vasala in the Munich Olympic Village. Nurmi had claimed that life had become too easy for the Finns and they would never regain the early glory. Victories by Viren and Vasala would prove him wrong. Nurmi died a year later at the age of 76.

Eyewitness: Nurmi on Nurmi, The Early Years

Nurmi made the following remarks two years before his death in an interview with Kauko Niemela, originally published in a club newsletter and then in the book, "Top Distance Runners of the Century," by Seppo Luhtala:

If I had been aware of the present training methods, I would have run better, especially in 1920-26. Finnish runners develop slowly, and I think that is the right thing to do. As to myself. I reached the top gradually and also slowed down gradually. As a youngster I had no idea whatsoever of correct training systems, but that applied to all other runners as well.

Playing with schoolmates, I usually had the most speed and stamina in running games, so perhaps I had more talent for this event than small boys usually have. Also, it should be remembered that I entered working life early, pushing heavy carts on the hilly streets of Turku as an errand boy, which certainly had something to with the strengthening of my leg muscles.

In the summertime, we used to swim at Ruissalo Park, where we always went by foot, either running or walking. It was 6 kilometers one way, which meant quite a lot of exercise since we sometimes covered this distance-to and back-twice a day. I was greatly inspired by the news of Hannes Kolehmainen's Olympic victories in Stockholm in 1912. A few days later, I bought my first pair of sneakers at 15 years of age.

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