O’Hare goes flat out to find ideal distance in his search for Euro glory
MARK WOODS
TIME and again Chris O’Hare has gone hunting for a major 1,500 metres title and come up short. Two European bronze medals are impressive but not what the Scot demands of himself. Sometimes, a change can be good for body and mind. And although the 28-year-old says he still has unfulfilled ambitions over the metric mile, the way he destroyed rivals over 3,000m at the UK Indoor Championships yesterday in Birmingham suggested he might have found his niche. With the event doubling as the trials for the European Indoors in Glasgow in less than three weeks, O’Hare was the sly fox as he flummoxed training partner Andy Butchart with a dynamic burst to victory. ‘He did the hard part, I had the easier job,’ O’Hare said. ‘With three laps to go I could feel him wavering. I saw people closing on us, so I thought the best thing for us both was for me to take it and keep that gap, so he didn’t need to worry about out-kicking other people.’ Butchart was pipped into third by Charlie Grice but the Dunblane man is still likely to be picked for Glasgow. ‘Butchy’s fitter than I am,’ admitted O’Hare, who trains with him in the USA. ‘But it’s an on-the-day thing.’ Six Scots guaranteed themselves slots at the Emirates Arena in March with Laura Muir winning the 3,000m before confirming she’ll defend her European titles at that distance and over 1,500m. She will be joined in the latter by her training partner Jemma Reekie, who pulled off the kind of switch into top gear which is Muir’s signature move, to impressively claim the British title. ‘I didn’t know I could do that,’ the 20-year-old said. ‘But then I did it and thought: “That was something new”. I had a plan and it all came together.’ Neil Gourley earned a major championship debut with an indoor personal best of three minutes 44.76 seconds to win the men’s 1500m, while Aberdonian Zoey Clark took the 400m crown, with Eilidh Doyle fourth. Katarina Johnson-Thompson won long jump gold, a day after taking silver in the 60m hurdles. The heptathlete, who will head to Glasgow as favourite for pentathlon gold in the absence of Olympic champion Nafi Thiam, who is injured, jumped 6.46m — ten centimetres clear of Jahisha Thomas in second. Johnson-Thompson, gold medallist at the Commonwealth Games and World Indoors last year, said: ‘It is the best I’ve felt at this point in a season. Hopefully I can get it right in Glasgow.’ Meanwhile, British Athletics are facing the headache of being unable to deploy a full sprint team in Glasgow. A combination of male sprinters not competing at Birmingham, and the poor showing of those who did, has meant only three men have fulfilled the qualification criteria for the 60m sprint in Glasgow. Of that trio, Nethaneel Mitchell-Blake, the European 200m silver medallist, has made it clear to team bosses that he won’t be in Glasgow, leaving only two of three 60m spots in the squad filled. As it stands that means just Ojie Edoburun, eighth in Birmingham, and Harry Aikines-Aryeetey, who failed to make the final, have met the two requirements of having turned up to the Championships and made the qualifying time since the start of the 2018 season. None of the top three from Saturday’s 60m final — Dominic Ashwell, Adam Thomas and Jeremiah Azu — have hit the marks of 6.60sec in the 60m or 10.20sec in the 100m. British Athletics are now pinning their hopes on another sprinter delivering the 6.60sec time at the Muller Indoor Grand Prix in Birmingham this coming Saturday, with the team being announced a day later. That could yet open the door for 2014 world Indoor champion Richard Kilty, who has been invited to run at the Grand Prix but has not hit 6.60sec since 2017. The situation could see Britain miss out on a male 60m European indoor medal — after taking at least one at each of the past 16 editions — despite having, perhaps, its finest line-up of sprinters. Of those, none of Reece Prescod, Zharnel Hughes, CJ Ujah or Adam Gemili attended the British Indoors.