Stat of the Week: When was the last time that Bernard Lagat DNF'd?

Jul 20, 2013 by Mitch Kastoff

The Monaco Diamond League Meeting had mixed results for the Americans. On one end of the spectrum, you had Duane Solomon and Jenny Simpson pick up their first DL victory, the dominance of the American women in the 1500m, Justin Gatlin and Dentarius Locke going one-two in the 100m, an “A” for Shayala Kipp in the steeple, a sweep in the women’s 100mH, and wins in the men’s triple and women’s high jump.

The darker flip side, the men struggled in both the 1500m and 5k. Specifically (though there was more than one American we could mention), Bernard Lagat. The double World Champion told Flotrack pre-race that if all went well, the American record in the 5k could be in jeopardy.

Though Lagat is fit, we didn’t think the 12:53.60 mark could fall in Monaco. It didn’t. But that’s not the surprising fact about Lagat’s race.

While we watched the stream, we quickly scanned the chase pack to find Father Time. We couldn’t find him. After the race, we refreshed the results to see what he had run. We couldn’t find him.

Our immediate reaction was, “When was the last time the seemingly always healthy Lagat did not finish a race?”

Answer: Never.

According to the stat database tilastopaja.org, Lagat has finished every race he’s started since 1996. Even still, there are only two race that Lagat has ever not started (DNS): the '03 World Championship 1500m and the semifinal of the 800m at the '09 U.S. Championships.

Other than that, we couldn’t find anything. Did Lagat pick up an injury? LetsRun.com reported that, “Lagat’s agent James Templeton said Lagat pointed to his side during the race and James thought that mean a side stitch, but Lagat was really pointing at his hip which gave him problems last year.”

Sorry to disappoint tonight. Thank you @DrJoshGlass & Dustin Williams @trainer911 for taking care of my hip. I'll be back strong for Moscow
— Bernard Lagat (@Lagat1500) July 19, 2013