7/6/08

Most of the fans had filed out of Hayward Field, but Lopez Lomong was in no hurry to leave.

By finishing third in the men’s 1,500 meters, he had earned, chronologically speaking, the very last ticket to Beijing handed out in the U.S. Olympic Track & Field Trials. So he bounced up and down in bare feet, greeting the remnant of a record crowd of 21,176, savoring a long, slow trip around the track.