£1,500 taxi ride pays off for Muir as late burst lands bronze
LAURA MUIR’S drive through the snow to the start line was left perilously late and so was her run to the finish. But she got there in the end, taking a thrilling 3,000metres bronze medal in the World Indoor Championships last night. She did it the hard way, both in the logistics of her journey, which saw her arrive in Birmingham at 11pm on the eve of the competition after a £1,500, seven-hour taxi ride from Glasgow — and then in the race itself. The 24-year-old was down in fifth with three circuits of the 200m track to go. But in a quite brilliant finish, she passed Konstanze Klosterhalfen and Hellen Obiri, the world 5,000m champion, to take her first medal on the global stage. Genzebe Dibaba of Ethiopia won gold and Holland’s Sifan Hassan silver. It was a stunning result for Muir, who cemented her status as Britain’s leading talent with two European indoors gold medals in 2017 but whose 2018 has largely been geared towards completing her veterinary training at Glasgow University. She was studying as recently as Wednesday morning, which led to her mad dash to make the start line, but what an impact she made on arrival against one of the toughest fields in the sport. She said: ‘I was so hurting and I just had to dig deep. To get a European medal was brilliant. But to get a worlds third in that field, I am very happy.’ Earlier, Britain’s Morgan Lake cleared 1.93m in the high jump but lost a bronze medal on countback to Italy’s Alessia Trost, while Robbie Grabarz was a disappointing ninth in the men’s event. Meanwhile, British javelin coach David Burrell, 53, has been suspended for four years for ‘evading, refusing or failing to submit’ to a drugs test.