Sandford et al. 2019, tactical behaviour in championship 1500 m racing

Video analysis in Frontiers in Sports and Active Living of 16 elite men’s 1500 m championship finals (2000–2017), defining the tactical behaviour that separated medallists. The race kick consistently landed in the final 400 m or so (236–244 m from the finish), whether the race was fast or slow. Slow races contained far more mid-race surges (about five) than fast races (about one), and the last surge before the kick came much earlier in fast races (around 704 m out) than in slow races (around 370 m out). In fast races, the gold and silver medallists sat in position around second at the point the kick began, while bronze sat around fourth, so front positioning mattered; in slow races the positional differences between medallists were unclear, leaving room for come-from-behind wins. Descriptive analysis of a single event and sex, so its specific numbers extrapolate to other distances only cautiously.