Gourley determined to emulate fellow Scots & beat Ingebrigtsen
Neil Gourley wants it to be his "turn at the top of the podium" as he attempts to emulate fellow Scots Josh Kerr and Jake Wightman by becoming 1500m champion at September's World Championships in Tokyo.Gourley took his first global medal over the distance at the World Athletics Indoor Championships in Nanjing over the weekend, using his own captain's speech to the British team as inspiration, after he encouraged his fellow athletes to "leave room for the extraordinary".After being pipped to gold by middle distance great Jakob Ingebrigtsen, Gourley now wants to follow in his compatriots' footsteps in Japan after they both beat the Norwegian star to world 1500m gold.And he told BBC Scotland: "It sounds like my turn, doesn't it? I'm certainly going with that ambition. "It's going to be incredibly challenging with the level globally right now but I'm looking to go to Tokyo and take my turn on the top of the podium. It's a challenging one but I'm definitely up for the challenge."
A level of ambition Gourley is happy to embrace after the disappointment of missing out on the European and World Indoor championships, which were both held in Glasgow recently, the latter just last year.Allowing those mental scars to heal has helped the Giffnock AC athlete to achieve his dream of becoming a middle distance medallist on the global stage."Twelve months ago I wasn't in a great place mentally or physically," Gourley said. "I was quite upset watching the World Indoors happen here in Glasgow because it really would have been special to do it in my home city."To compete in front of so many family and friends who would have been there. I thought about that a lot on the day of the final [in Nanjing]."Sometimes these things do make you stronger mentally and this one certainly did. "It gave me a new appreciation for the sport and being healthy and enjoying it. Sometimes these things, although they're tough to take at the time, can create a bit of mental fortitude that I was able to call on this weekend."
'Leave room for the extraordinary'
The kind of mental fortitude, perhaps, that enabled Gourley to get up in front of his fellow athletes in Nanjing and deliver a rousing captain's speech, after he was given the honour of leading the British delegation."Leave some room for the extraordinary to happen," Gourley said, when asked what he told his team-mates. "Don't just go in thinking you'll do what you've been doing all season or compete within yourself."You've got to go out there and believe something else is there and you can take some chances and have some ambition."Gourley's ambition is certainly paying dividends. World silver on the mantelpiece and world gold in his sights.There's no chance his recent success will go to his head, however. Before arriving in Glasgow's east end, Gourley apologised for being a little late. He'd just had a visit from UK anti-doping for an out of competition test. Another sign, perhaps, that his star is very much on the rise.
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an hour ago
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How every Scotland player rated in Iceland friendly defeat
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