World record holder Ron Clarke of Australia set the tone of the race.

Halfway through the race, only five runners were still with Clarke: Mohammed Gammoudi of Tunisia, Mamo Wolde of Ethiopia, Barry Magee of New Zealand, Kokichi Tsuburaya of Japan, and Billy Mills of the United States.

Clarke recovered and began chasing Gammoudi while Mills appeared to be too far back to be in contention.

Clarke failed to catch Gammoudi, but Mills pulled out to lane 4 and sprinted past them both.

His winning time of 28:24.4 was almost 50 seconds faster than he had run before and set a new Olympic record for the event.