# Speed skating at the 2022 Winter Olympics – Men's 5000 metres

The men's 5000 m competition in speed skating at the 2022 Winter Olympics was held on 6 February, at the National Speed Skating Oval ("Ice Ribbon") in Beijing. The event was won by Nils van der Poel of Sweden. Patrick Roest of the Netherlands won the silver medal, and Hallgeir Engebråten of Norway the bronze medal. For van der Poel and Engebråten these are the first Olympic medals. Van der Poel's medal was the first Olympic medal in speed skating for Sweden since 1988, when Tomas Gustafson won both 5000 m and 10000 m.
The defending champion and the Olympic record holder was Sven Kramer. The silver medalist, Ted-Jan Bloemen, qualified for the Olympics as well. The bronze medalist, Sverre Lunde Pedersen, was not selected to skate at the event. Nils van der Poel is the 2021 World Single Distances champion at the 5000 m distance, with Patrick Roest and Sergey Trofimov being the silver and bronze medalist, respectively. Van der Poel was also the world record holder at the start of the Olympics. He was leading the 2021–22 ISU Speed Skating World Cup at long distances with four races completed before the Olympics, followed by Bloemen and Davide Ghiotto. Van der Poel's world record, 6:01.56 in Salt Lake City on 3 December 2021, was thus the season best time.
Sven Kramer was skating in the first pair and set the lead in the event. In pair 3, Hallgeir Engebråten improved Kramer's time by over 7 seconds, 0.12 seconds short of Kramer's Olympic record, and Sergey Trofimov became second. In pair 5, Patrick Roest, skating essentially alone, since his competitor was far behind, took the lead, setting a new Olympic record. This situation remained until the last pair, when Nils van der Poel, skating behind the Roest's scheme most of the distance, caught up at the last kilometer and became the champion with the new Olympic record.
In the flower ceremony after the race, the three medalists were handed an olympic mascot to take themselves from a board held by Jan Dijkema, President of the International Skating Union, dressed in face mask due to the ongoing pandemic. The medal ceremony was scheduled for the day after the race.

## Qualification

A total of 20 entry quotas were available for the event, with a maximum of three athletes per NOC. The first 14 athletes qualified through their performance at the 2021–22 ISU Speed Skating World Cup, while the last six earned quotas by having the best times among athletes not already qualified. A country could only earn the maximum three spots through the World Cup rankings.
The qualification time for the event (6:30.00) was released on July 1, 2021, and was unchanged from 2018. Skaters had the time period of July 1, 2021 – January 16, 2022 to achieve qualification times at valid International Skating Union (ISU) events.

## Records

Prior to this competition, the existing world and Olympic records were as follows.
| World record | Nils van der Poel (SWE) | 6:01.56 | Salt Lake City, United States | 3 December 2021 |
| Olympic record | Sven Kramer (NED) | 6:09.76 | Gangneung, South Korea | 11 February 2018 |
| Track record | Hanahati Muhamaiti (CHN) | 6:37.80 | | 7 April 2021 |
A new Olympic record was set in the competition.
| Date | Round | Athlete | Country | Time | Record |
| 6 February | Pair 10 | Nils van der Poel | Sweden | 6:08.84 | OR, TR |

## Results

The races were started at 16:30.
| Rank | Pair | Lane | Name | Country | Time | Time behind | Notes |
| | 10 | I | Nils van der Poel | Sweden | 6:08.84 | | OR |
| | 5 | O | Patrick Roest | Netherlands | 6:09.31 | +0.47 | |
| | 3 | O | Hallgeir Engebråten | Norway | 6:09.88 | +1.04 | |
| 4 | 3 | I | Sergey Trofimov | ROC | 6:10.27 | +1.43 | |
| 5 | 6 | I | Jorrit Bergsma | Netherlands | 6:13.18 | +4.34 | |
| 6 | 8 | I | Aleksandr Rumyantsev | ROC | 6.15.02 | +6.18 | |
| 7 | 10 | O | Bart Swings | Belgium | 6:16.90 | +8.06 | |
| 8 | 8 | O | Davide Ghiotto | Italy | 6:16.92 | +8.08 | |
| 9 | 1 | I | Sven Kramer | Netherlands | 6:17.04 | +8.20 | |
| 10 | 9 | O | Ted-Jan Bloemen | Canada | 6:19.11 | +10.27 | |
| 11 | 7 | I | Patrick Beckert | Germany | 6:19.58 | +10.74 | |
| 12 | 6 | O | Seitaro Ichinohe | Japan | 6:19.81 | +10.97 | |
| 13 | 2 | O | Felix Rijhnen | Germany | 6:19.86 | +11.02 | |
| 14 | 9 | I | Ruslan Zakharov | ROC | 6:21.00 | +12.16 | |
| 15 | 7 | O | Michele Malfatti | Italy | 6:21.47 | +12.63 | |
| 16 | 2 | I | Emery Lehman | United States | 6:21.80 | +12.96 | |
| 17 | 4 | O | Ethan Cepuran | United States | 6:25.97 | +17.13 | |
| 18 | 4 | I | Livio Wenger | Switzerland | 6:27.01 | +18.17 | |
| 19 | 1 | O | Viktor Hald Thorup | Denmark | 6:28.87 | +20.03 | |
| 20 | 5 | I | Andrea Giovannini | Italy | 6:30.11 | +21.27 | |