The Courier & Advertiser (Fife Edition)
Scots play partin clinching silver
Doyle and Clark part of 4x400 relay team to finish second behind US
Eilidh Doyle and Zoey Clark helped Great Britain to a silver medal in the 4x400m at the World Championships as the home nation’s relay success continued over from Saturday night.
The Scots, stationed on legs three and one, respectively, teamed up with Laviai Nielsen and Emily Diamond to record a time of 3:25.00 as the USA ran away with the gold medal.
Britain were helped on their quest for a podium spot by Jamaica exiting the race as Anneisha Mclaughlan-Whilby pulled up with what looked like a hamstring problem – the second in as many nights for Jamaica after Usain Bolt suffered from cramp in Saturday’s 4x100m final – on the second leg to allow the home quartet a free shot at the USA.
Aberdeen’s Clark’s reaction time of 0.189s was the fourth best in the field, and a solid first leg put Britain in a strong position when handing over to Nielsen.
When the stagger ended and the field came together, Britain were a clear second, with Poland and France their closest rivals.
But Doyle stretched their lead on the third leg, to hand over to Diamond who just had to maintain her advantage to give Britain a famous silver.
The men’s team followed up by taking bronze behind winners Trinidad and Tobago and USA.
The squad of Matthew HudsonSmith, Martyn Rooney, Rabah Yousif and Dwayne Cowan, clocked a season’s best of two minutes 59 seconds.
Elsewhere on the final night, Laura Muir claims the double is the future for her after she saw enough in her World Championships attempt to know she is capable of it in the future.
The Dundee Hawkhill Harrier finished sixth in the 5,000 final, following up her fourth in the 1,500m last weekend, with club-mate Eilish McColgan coming home 10th.
Hellen Obiri, who ran away from the field with 10,000m champion Alma Ayana after the opening laps, won the race for Kenya.
Muir finished strongly in the final 200m and crossed the line in 14:52.07, while McColgan clocked 15:00.43.
“I’m really happy,” said Muir. “Really happy with sixth in the world in an event that I’d only ran once before outdoors. So I’m really pleased with that race,” added the 24-year-old from Milnathort.
“I was going to let Ayana and Obiri go anyway, I knew they are in a class of their own just now, so I wasn’t too worried about them breaking away, but I just knew from myself that I have a lot of rounds in the legs.
“I needed to pace myself and stay strong, and I think I showed that in the last lap, finishing the way I did.”
McColgan, meanwhile, was not satisfied with her performance, despite having run a personal best in the heats and backed that up with another run close to 15 minutes.
The race was run at a strange tempo, with the opening laps being run at a crawl, before Obiri and Ayana exploded the race.
“I’m slightly disappointed with that,” said the Dundonian. “It was totally different to what I expected it to be. I just thought it would be fast from the start and we’d all be hanging on, but we were practically walking those first couple of laps. So I got a bit of a shock when it picked up. It’s always a shock and it’s definitely something I need to get used to doing, I struggled a bit in Rio with that.
“I’ve maybe not done enough 1,500s or championships to experience that, but I can’t really be too disheartened because it’s still two 15-minute runs within the space of three days.”
There was more Kenyan joy in the men’s 1,500m as Elijah Manangoi claimed gold in 3:33.61, ahead of teammate Timothy Cheruiyot. Norway’s Filip Ingebrigtsen held on for bronze.
Chris O’Hare finished last with a time of 3:38.28, and fellow Scot Lynsey Sharp could do no better in her 800m final, with her 1:58.98 only good enough for eighth.
Caster Semenya stormed away down the home straight to claim the gold.
The South African backed up her Olympic title by powering home in a personal best one minute 55.16 seconds, the fastest time in the world for nine years.
Francine Niyonsaba of Burundi and American Ajee Wilson were in the mix as the race entered the home straight, but Semenya stepped on the accelerator to pull away and win by 0.76seconds.
Britain’s Robbie Grabarz, who won Olympic bronze in London five years ago, failed to make an impact in the high jump final and bowed out having failed to clear 2.29 metres.
Qatar’s Mutaz Essa Barshim, the great home hope for the next Worlds in Doha in 2019, ensured he would head into that event as the defending champion by winning gold with a leap of 2.35m.
Dominant Croatian Sandra Perkovic took discus gold with a throw of 70.31m.
Britain’s Tom Bosworth was left heartbroken after seeing his hopes of a medal in the 20 kilometres walk dashed by a disqualification on the Mall.
The 27-year-old collapsed to the side of the road in tears after a third red card brought his race to a dramatic end.
He said: “I haven’t been disqualified for four and a half years so to do it here in London is devastating.”
Colombia’s Eider Arevalo won gold in one hour 18 minutes and 53 seconds.
The United States finished the championship top of the medal table with 10 golds and 30 medals.
You can help the next generation of young British athletes by getting involved in SportsAid Week this September with London 2012 hero Greg Rutherford. Find out more about how you can support the week of fun and fundraising by visiting www.sportsaid.org.uk/sportsaidweek