The final positions (top 8) were as follows:
1. Alberto Cova (28’01.04)
2. Schildhauer (28’01.18)
3. Kunze (28’01.26)
4. Vainio (28’01.37)
5. Shahanga (28’01.93)
6. Lopes (28’06.78)
7. Rose (28’07.53)
8. Herle (28’09.05)
All the runners who finished ahead of Shahanga were proven to be dopers:
Alberto Cova later admitted to blood doping. Blood doping is the practice of boosting the number of red blood cells in the bloodstream in order to enhance athletic performance. It was not illegal at the time.
The two East Germans Schildhauer and Kunze were part of the Government sponsored East German doping program.
Vainio came from Finland, a country that is well known to have invented and perfected the art of blood doping. In addition, Vainio failed adrug test at the 1984 Olympics when he tested positive for a banned substance known as metonolone.
In essence, all the runners who beat Shahanga into 5th place were doping. Shahanga was likely the only clean runner among the top 5.
Doping was rampant among European athletes during this era due to lax testing. Which is why Europeans for the most part dominated distance running during that era. Finland in particular had numerous Olympic gold medalists like Pekka Vassala and Lasse Viren. It was Viren who became well known as the first athlete to use blood doping to ultimate success when he won the 5000m and the 10,000m at both the 1972 and 1976 Olympics.
But it was the East German state sponsored doping regime that pushed doping to extreme levels. The East Germans were intent on proving that communism was superior to capitalism and they wanted to use sports as their avenue to make their point. It worked to a large extent because East Germany was often at the top of the Athletics medal standings leaving the Americans in their wake.
With today’s dope testing standards, it is likely that some of these athletes would have been exposed for doping, granting Shahanga a medal, possibly gold.
As a side note, it is worth noting that no Kenyan qualified for the 10,000m at the 1983 world athletics championships. kenyan athletics was undergoing a depression after having boycotted both the 1976 and 1980 Olympics which left Kenyan runners demotivated and demoralized.