Rearuh

Men's 800 metres at the Games of the XI Olympiad
Venue	Olympiastadion: Berlin, Germany
Dates	August 2 (heats) August 3 (semifinals) August 4 (final)
Competitors	42 from 23 nations
Medalists
John Woodruff  United States Mario Lanzi  Italy Phil Edwards  Canada
← 1932 1948 →

Athletics at the 1936 Summer Olympics
Track events
100 m	men	women
200 m	men
400 m	men
800 m	men
1500 m	men
5000 m	men
10,000 m	men
80 m hurdles		women
110 m hurdles	men
400 m hurdles	men
3000 m steeple	men
4×100 m relay	men	women
4×400 m relay	men
Road events
Marathon	men
50 km walk	men
Field events
Long jump	men
Triple jump	men
High jump	men	women
Pole vault	men
Shot put	men
Discus throw	men	women
Javelin throw	men	women
Hammer throw	men
Combined events
Decathlon	men
v t e

The men's 800 metres event at the 1936 Summer Olympic Games took place between August 2 and August 4. The final was won by American John Woodruff.^[1]

Summary

With all runners starting from a crouch position, in the middle of the straightaway, the only returning medalist from 1932, Phil Edwards rushed to the lead. Down the backstretch he was joined by John Woodruff. For the second day in a row, the Nazi home crowd was seeing two black North Americans leading a final after Jesse Owens and Ralph Metcalfe winning the 100 metres. Along the home stretch, Kazimierz Kucharski came along the outside, with Brian MacCabe in tow, effectively boxing Woodruff on the rail. Sensing the danger, Woodruff slowed, dropping to sixth place but giving himself free running room. With a long relaxed stride, the tall Woodruff ran around the outside and past Edwards into the lead. Heading into the final turn, Edwards again accelerated into the lead, but Woodruff stayed with him as both separated from Kucharski and Chuck Hornbostel. With the trailers struggling, a path down the rail opened up for Mario Lanzi to run past them on the inside. Through the turn, Edwards was unable to break Woodruff. Coming off the turn, it was Woodruff's long stride that took the advantage over the smaller Edwards. Now it was Edwards who was struggling as Woodruff pulled away with only half the straightaway to the finish. Lanzi seized the opportunity to run past Edwards on the outside, but there was no time to run after Woodruff.

Results

Heats

The fastest four runners in each of the six heats advanced to the semifinal round.

Heat one

Rank	Name	Nationality	Time	Notes
1	Phil Edwards	Canada	1:53.7
2	Chuck Hornbostel	United States	1:53.7
3	Jean Verhaert	Belgium	1:54.3
4	Ferenc Temesvári	Hungary	1:55.0
5	Pierre Hemmer	Luxembourg	1:56.3
6	Rudolf Harbig	Germany	1:56.8
7	Francisco Váldez	Peru
8	Stavros Velkopoulos	Greece

Heat two

Rank	Name	Nationality	Time	Notes
1	Harry Williamson	United States	1:56.2
2	Ab Conway	Canada	1:56.2
3	Pat Boot	New Zealand	1:56.6
4	Emil Hübscher	Austria	1:57.3
5	Emil Goršek	Yugoslavia	1:59.5
6	Carlos Marcenaro	Peru	2:00.8

Heat three

Rank	Name	Nationality	Time	Notes
1	Brian MacCabe	Great Britain	1:54.5
2	Raymond Petit	France	1:54.8
3	Hjalmar Johannessen	Norway	1:54.9
4	Ewald Mertens	Germany	1:55.1
5	Clarke Scholtz	South Africa	1:57.6
6	Toshinao Tomie	Japan	1:59.9
7	Stanislav Otáhal	Czechoslovakia
8	Gyan Bhalla	India

Heat four

Rank	Name	Nationality	Time	Notes
1	Gerald Backhouse	Australia	1:57.7
2	Miklós Szabó	Hungary	1:57.8
3	John Woodruff	United States	1:58.7
4	Frank Handley	Great Britain	1:58.9
5	Evžen Rošický	Czechoslovakia	1:59.5
6	Paul Martin	Switzerland	2:00.0
7	Charles Stein	Luxembourg

Heat five

Rank	Name	Nationality	Time	Notes
1	Jack Powell	Great Britain	1:56.0
2	Mario Lanzi	Italy	1:56.1
3	Franz Eichberger	Austria	1:56.3
4	József Vadas	Hungary	1:56.5
5	Willie Botha	South Africa	1:57.0
6	Grigorios Georgakopoulos	Greece	1:57.3
7	Jack Liddle	Canada

Heat six

Rank	Name	Nationality	Time	Notes
1	Juan Carlos Anderson	Argentina	1:55.1
2	Kazimierz Kucharski	Poland	1:55.7
3	Wolfgang Dessecker	Germany	1:56.0
4	René Soulier	France	1:56.1
5	William Lindeque	South Africa	1:56.4
6	Kumao Aochi	Japan	1:56.8

Semifinals

The fastest three runners in each of the three heats advanced to the final round.

Heat one

Rank	Name	Nationality	Time	Notes
1	John Woodruff	United States	1:52.7
2	Kazimierz Kucharski	Poland	1:54.7
3	Juan Carlos Anderson	Argentina	1:54.8
4	Miklós Szabó	Hungary	1:55.1
5	Wolfgang Dessecker	Germany	1:55.3
6	Franz Eichberger	Austria	1:56.2
7	Pat Boot	New Zealand
8	Frank Handley	Great Britain

Heat two

Rank	Name	Nationality	Time	Notes
1	Harry Williamson	United States	1:53.1
2	Gerald Backhouse	Australia	1:53.2
3	Phil Edwards	Canada	1:53.2
4	Jack Powell	Great Britain	1:54.8
5	Ewald Mertens	Germany	1:54.9
6	René Soulier	France	1:56.8
7	Emil Hübscher	Austria
8	József Vadas	Hungary

Heat three

Rank	Name	Nationality	Time	Notes
1	Chuck Hornbostel	United States	1:53.2
2	Mario Lanzi	Italy	1:54.1
3	Brian MacCabe	Great Britain	1:55.4
4	Raymond Petit	France	1:55.7
5	Ab Conway	Canada	1:55.9
6	Hjalmar Johannessen	Norway	1:56.0
7	Ferenc Temesvári	Hungary
8	Jean Verhaert	Belgium

Final

Rank	Name	Nationality	Time	Notes
	John Woodruff	United States	1:52.9
	Mario Lanzi	Italy	1:53.3
	Phil Edwards	Canada	1:53.6
4	Kazimierz Kucharski	Poland	1:53.8
5	Chuck Hornbostel	United States	1:54.6
6	Harry Williamson	United States	1:55.8
7	Juan Carlos Anderson	Argentina
8	Gerald Backhouse	Australia
9	Brian MacCabe	Great Britain

References