Colorado’s Elise Cranny is headed back to the 5,000-meter Olympic finals.
Niwot’s running marvel had the seventh-fastest time in the event during Friday’s preliminary at the Stade de France in Saint-Denis, qualifying in 14 minutes and 58.55 seconds. That puts the 28-year-old in the 16-woman final on Monday, which starts 1:15 p.m. local time.
Late in her preliminary race, Cranny was just a few feet behind heat-winner Faith Kipyegon, the Kenyan who held off Tokyo gold-medalist Sifan Hassan of the Netherlands with the fastest time of the day, 14:57.56, before making her last push.
The shadow of a tightly-wound leading pack of nine runners, for a moment — in a race that sent through only the top eight — she then worked ahead of American teammate Karissa Schweizer and Japan’s Nozomi Tanaka in the final 100 meters. Schweizer (14:59.64) grabbed the last qualifying spot of the heat, while Tanaka, though her time of 15:00.62 was better than anyone from Heat 2, missed the finals cut.
At the Tokyo Games in 2021, Cranny finished 13th in 14:55.98. In her Paris finale, she will be among three Americans, including Whittni Morgan, who qualified from the second heat.
In her earlier running days, Cranny won six individual state track and field titles and two in cross country while at Niwot and was a 12-time All-American at Stanford.