WORLD RECORD GLORY FOR MO
Fabulous Farah beats Gebrselassie’s hour best by 45 metres
He beat the clock and avenged the watch. only Mo Farah can decide if that’s a good return from his recent dealings with Haile Gebrselassie, but at the very least he has the most recent laugh in their feud after breaking the ethiopian’s one-hour world record in Brussels last night.
not that it was straightforward. For a good chunk of his attempt to run the furthest distance ever recorded in 60 minutes, he was off the pace, particularly around halfway when he fell 10 metres shy of where he needed to be to match the 13-year-old record.
But Farah has always been a quick finisher and ultimately blitzed the ghost mark of his nemesis in the final quarter. By the time a blitz of fireworks signalled that his time was up, he had covered 21,330m (13.25 miles) in his first track race for three years, eclipsing Gebrselassie’s 2007 run by 45m. In doing so Farah had his first outdoor world record at the age of 37.
While Farah’s prime feeling about the run will be that it proves his form after a hard year, he will possibly also draw private satisfaction from beating Gebrselassie, given it was the ethiopian legend with whom he had such an almighty row last year.
that started when Farah claimed unprompted ahead of the 2019 London Marathon that his watch and cash was stolen in Gebrselassie’s hotel near addis ababa, and in turn it provoked an avalanche of allegations from the other side.
among the accusations were that Farah had behaved ‘disgracefully’ during his stay, attacked a couple in his gym, and once tried to gain admission for Jama aden, a Somali coach who is wanted in Spain on doping charges. It was denied by Farah’s team but the headlines travelled fast.
In the build-up to this record attempt, Farah said nothing of that spat, only that Gebrselassie has ‘done a lot for athletics’. For a time, his mark seemed out of reach, and even when Farah got back on the pace, he fell behind his training partner and race-day opponent Bashir abdi. However, with a 63.9sec final lap, Farah burnt him off and made history.
He said: ‘I’m very happy to break the world record. What an amazing way to do it and show the people what is possible. I feel tired. We had to work hard. We helped each other get through but it is nice to get the world record.’
earlier, Sifan Hassan, the world 1500m and 10,000m champion from the netherlands, reached 18,930 metres to break the women’s record of 18,517m, set by ethiopia’s Dire tune in 2008.
Meanwhile, uK athletics chief executive Joanna Coates has defended Christian Malcolm’s lack of experience and insists the new head coach of the British team can be ‘our Pep Guardiola’. Malcolm, 41, was a popular yet surprise choice for the position at the top of the olympic programme after holding off competition from Stephen Maguire, 57, and Peter eriksson, 67. Malcolm will start in December after 18 months as head of performance at australia athletics.
In explaining his appointment, Coates pointed to the examples of Pep Guardiola and Mikel arteta, whose ideas trumped age when they were given their starts in football management. She said: ‘We want someone to fundamentally make the difference in this sport. He is our Pep. I’ve definitely gone for a young, visionary and innovative coach. I know he hasn’t had years of coaching but being a head coach is not about coaching individual athletes.’
on day one of the British Championships in Manchester, Harry Coppell set a new national pole vault record of 5.85m. the wider championships severely have been undermined by the absence of Britain’s leading names.