KERR’S ‘COOL’ SCOTS TARGET
Commonwealth Games is next aim for Josh in hectic 2022
OLYMPIC hero Josh Kerr has delivered a major boost to Team Scotland’s Commonwealth Games ambitions — by revealing that he’s got his heart set on flying the Saltire in the Midlands next summer.
The US-based middle-distance runner, who finished third in the 1500 metres in Tokyo, is looking forward to a 2022 season that will condense three major championships into a hectic five-week spell.
There have been fears that squeezing Birmingham 2022 in between the World Championships in Oregon and the European Championships in Berlin would lead to a number of big-name track-and-field stars dropping the Commonwealth Games from their schedule.
But Kerr, only pipped to the line by Norwegian great Jakob Ingebrigtsen and Kenya’s Timothy Cheruiyot as he set a new Scottish record in the Olympic final, revealed: ‘I’ve never run at the Commonwealth Games — and hopefully I will be selected by Team Scotland.
‘I love major championship running. I would love to run a Commonwealth Games.
‘Those are the kinds of things when growing up, and competing in Scottish age group champs or whatever, that you are looking towards and wanting to be involved in.
‘It would be a really cool thing to do to wear a Scotland vest. I’ve not been home for a very long time, so Birmingham 2022 is a big goal for next summer.
‘It is pretty much the same as a World Champs except we don’t have the Americans and the Norwegians. I’ll just have to deal with the Kenyans in the 1500m.
‘I’m very excited about next summer because I am a championship racer and that’s why I’m in the sport. I’d say I would like to race in at least two of the big championship events next summer.’
News of Kerr prioritising the Commonwealth Games comes after Andy Young, coach of Laura Muir and Jemma Reekie, reported that both were likely to fit Birmingham into a hectic schedule next summer.
Kerr, in a special interview with Scottish Athletics, revealed that the achievements of Team GB colleagues Muir and Keely Hodgkinson — both silver medal winners in Tokyo — had inspired him to make the Olympic podium.
Explaining that he’d been playing pool in the Olympic village with fellow 1500m finalists Jake Wightman and Jake Heyward when Hodginkson dropped by wearing her silver from the 800 metres, Kerr said: ‘Everyone reacts in a different way to a team-mate or someone in your group having some success.
‘You do tend to look at it and think: “That’s what I want to be going through”.
‘Keely came back to our apartment and I think myself and two Jakes were playing pool or something like that. She hung out with us for a while and had her medal with her. It was a big “respect” moment.
‘But I had to take myself away from it after a bit because you can get too excited about what someone else has achieved. That’s not why you are there.
‘I was delighted for Keely, of course, and then also for Laura Muir — although Laura’s final was the night before ours so we didn’t cross paths much at all and she had a lot of media to do the following day.
‘But they were both very big motivators to say: “This is possible”. Seeing Keely made it very realistic.
‘I don’t do my social media when at a major champs, so I probably wasn’t close to the feeling back in Scotland but we watched the race and the interviews and of course we knew what it meant to Laura.
‘In her interview she said how hard she had worked and for how long and, again, that was another motivator for me — to try to grab the Olympic opportunity. I could see the emotion. I’ve watched Laura racing growing up myself and racing 1500m, so a medal close to home was inspirational.
‘Tokyo was at the front of my mind for a long time and you put a plan together to try to peak on the date of the final — August 7, 2021. Then you just hope and pray that it goes to plan and things don’t go wrong; there are so many little variables that can happen.
‘I’m proud of how I handled it all — and thrilled to come away with some “hardware”.’