12

Thursday, June 14 2018
The Michigan Daily — michigandaily.com
SPORTS

With 100 meters to go in the 
men’s 10,000-meter national 
championship 
race, 
Ben 
Flanagan was in second place 
and on the move.
Trailing pre-meet favorite 
Vincent Kiprop of Alabama, 
the fifth-year senior on the 
Michigan men’s track and 
field team found an extra 
gear. He began to accelerate, 
narrowing the gap with each 
stride.
With just 10 meters to go, 
Flanagan 
overtook 
Kiprop, 
and he held on to win the race 
by 0.46 seconds, completing 
the race in 28:34.54.
After beginning the race as 
the No. 23 seed in a 24-man 
field, he was the national 
champion.
And 
the 
first 
thing 
he 
wanted to do was see his mom.
“As soon as I crossed the 
finish line, the first thing that 
crossed my mind was I was 
like, ‘Oh my gosh, I want to 
share this moment with my 
mom so bad,’ ” Flanagan said 
in a conference call Thursday.
“She gets so nervous for 
these races and having her here 
to watch that performance and 
obviously my dad and my uncle 
as well, meant so much to me. 
But that was the first thing I 
thought about as soon as the 
race was over. I was like, ‘I 
gotta go see my mom, because 
I know how much she’s gonna 
enjoy this moment and I really 
want to share it with her.’ ”
A gritty race from Flanagan 
was a fitting end to a collegiate 
career riddled with adversity. 
He shattered his previous 
personal-best 
time 
by 
39 
seconds.
“Obviously this was a huge 
breakthrough race for me, 
and I’m so ecstatic about it,” 
Flanagan said. “But going into 
the race, I knew that I really 
did believe I had a shot at it… 
It was just an amazing day.”
Flanagan’s 
run 
to 
the 
national title was long — 
longer than he ever would 
have imagined. After a strong 
2016 season that culminated 
in 14th place at the NCAA 
Outdoor 
Championships 
in 
the 10,000-meter, he found 
himself battling through a foot 
injury the following fall. Then 
he was diagnosed with a sacral 
stress fracture in his back, and 
his hopes of improving on his 

2016 placing were dashed.
But 
he 
kept 
working, 
fighting 
to 
stay 
positive 
throughout his rehab and find 
his way back onto the track. It 
paid off, and he now embodies 
Bo 
Schembechler’s 
iconic 
quote, “Those who stay will be 
champions.”
“In those moments when 
things are at their toughest, 
at the peak of the injury when 
you don’t really know what 
the future holds, and things 
are a little bit uncertain, 
you’ve just gotta take those 
small victories and those just 
kind of start to snowball on 
each other,” Flanagan said. 
“Luckily, things really started 
to come around this season.”
Things 
started 
coming 
around when Flanagan began 
his postseason campaign with 
a Big Ten title in the 10,000-
meter — his second title in 
three years in the event after 
earning his first in 2016. He 
shaved more than a minute 
off that Big Ten-winning time 
at the NCAA East Region 
preliminaries — going from 
30:23.86 to 29:17.24 — to place 
third and set up his chance at 
a national title.
“I 
think 
the 
biggest 
takeaway 
I 
had 
from 
my 
injuries is that you just can’t 
take any moment for granted,” 
Flanagan said. “That was kind 
of my mentality this entire 
season after the setbacks and 
the 
adversity 
and 
coming 
back, and then having another 
setback.
“At Big Tens it felt great, 
regionals it felt even better, 
and I just went into every 
single race like, ‘You know 
what, we’ve got another day, 
the body’s cooperating again, 
just enjoy the moment and 
have fun with it.’ And coming 
into nationals, still feeling 
healthy and ready to roll, I 
just really wanted to take 
advantage of the opportunity 
and have as much fun and 
enjoy the moment.”
***
Several 
of 
Flanagan’s 
teammates joined him at the 
NCAA outdoor championships 
— 
fifth-year 
senior 
Grant 
Cartwright, 
junior 
Andrew 
Liskowitz, 
junior 
Taylor 
McLaughlin, 
and 
redshirt 
sophomore Brandon Piwinski.
Cartwright and Liskowitz 
both 
competed 
in 
the 
shotput, 
placing 
11th 
and 
14th, respectively. Cartwright 

tossed a career-best 19.61m 
in the semifinals but missed 
qualifying for the final by just 
two placings.
“He’s always been a leader. 
He’s always come through in 
the clutch situations like 90% 
of the time and he sure did it 
in this championship phase 
of the season,” said Michigan 
coach 
Jerry 
Clayton. 
“To 
perform 
well 
at 
the 
Big 
Tens, then come back to the 
preliminary rounds with a 
personal best, and then come 
here to the NCAA meet with 
another personal best. … That 
mark would have probably 
made 
the 
final 
any 
year 
previous to this.”
Piwinski battled wind and 
rain in his high jump final and 
finished in a three-way tie for 
18th, earning him honorable 
mention All-American honors.
“Brandon coming in just 
getting to the meet was quite an 
accomplishment with what he 
did at the preliminary round,” 
Clayton said. “Then coming in 
here competing under pretty 
adverse conditions with the 
rain, I thought he did a good 
job. … I feel that he competed 
well under those conditions 
and that’s all you could ask 
and that’s the best he could 
do.”
McLaughlin placed second 
in the semifinal of the 400-
meter hurdles to qualify for 
the final, then took more than 
half a second off his qualifying 
time to place fifth with a time 
of 49:59 — his career-best time 
in an NCAA championship.
Flanagan’s 
win 
and 
McLaughlin’s placing earned 
the Wolverines a total of 14 
points toward the team title 
— placing them 20th out of 69 
teams.
***
More than 12 hours after 
winning his title, Flanagan 
could 
not 
contain 
his 
excitement over the result.
“It was awesome to finish 
my collegiate career in the 
best way I could ever imagine, 
I’m so excited about that,” 
Flanagan 
said. 
“(NCAA 
competition) has been such 
a high priority for me the 
past five years, my dedication 
to Michigan’s program and 
doing everything I could to 
represent the Michigan block 
‘M’ to the best of my abilities.”
And there’s no better way to 
represent the block ‘M’ than 
by winning a national title.

BAILEY JOHNSON
Daily Sports Writer

ALEC COHEN / DAILY
DESIGN BY JACK SILBERMAN

Flanagan wins
national championship 
in 10,000-meter

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