Tsegay dominates 1500m for championship record
Gudaf Tsegay makes it look easy with a time of 3:54.86 in the women's 1500m, smashing the championship record at the World Indoor Championships in Nanjing, China.
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Yahoo
02-05-2025
- Yahoo
David Ovens: Athletics is, and has been for some time, Scotland's leading sport
David Ovens is understandably upbeat when talking about the recent past, present and future of his sport. The chair of scottishathletics has, after all, just witnessed a Scot win yet another major championship medal, he's played a significant role in ensuring the sport's primary competition venue will remain open and he's optimistic that a new generation of Scottish athletes will soon emerge onto the world stage. It comes, then, as little surprise that Ovens believes athletics is, as things stand, Scotland's leading sport. 'Athletics is clearly Scotland's most successful sport at the moment and, in my opinion, has been for the past decade or so,' he says. 'There's a range of factors that go into athletics being such a strong and successful sport but, from my perspective, the most important thing is that the foundations are really solid so it develops from there.' One of the most headline-grabbing moments so far of 2025 was Neil Gourley's silver medal-winning performance in the 1500m at the World Indoor Championships in Nanjing in March. It was an impressive performance in itself but even more impressive was its contribution to one of the most remarkable statistics in Scottish sport; Scottish athletes have won medals at nine of the past ten major athletics championships, with Olympic silverware and world titles included in that streak. For Ovens, Gourley's run was satisfying to watch not only because it extended the run of success of Scottish athletes at the highest level, but also because it was, at the grand old age of 30, the Glaswegian's first global silverware. 'Another major medal was fantastic and I'm really pleased for Neil because that medal has been coming for quite some time,' Ovens says. Neil Gourley won World Indoor 1500m silver earlier this year (Image: Getty Images) 'Neil is part of a generation where there's an ingrained mentality that they will be competing on the world stage for medals and so it was great for him, and the sport, to see it happen.' Gourley's world indoor silver medal came just weeks before what could be considered an even more significant development; the confirmation that Grangemouth Stadium would remain open. For several years, Grangemouth Stadium, which is used regularly for junior, senior and masters Scottish athletics competitions, has been under the threat of closure but finally, a solution has been found that will ensure at the very least, the short-term future of the venue and also, hopes Ovens, the long-term future too. David Ovens (Image: Bobby Gavin/Scottish Athletics) From the 1st of June, the Grangemouth Community Sports Trust will take over the facility and given the venue's significance for the sport in this country, Ovens is barely able to mask his relief that closure has been prevented. However, he also notes his disappointment that there's hasn't been greater understanding from those at the very top of quite how valuable sports facilities are to this country and its population. 'Grangemouth has been earmarked for closure for a number of years so we've worked hard to reduce what was a significant financial deficit when it was in the hands of the council to a place where it should break even,' he says 'It's a huge thing for the sport to keep Grangemouth open. It's our most important stadium geographically because 50 so many of our athletes can get there within an hour. It's our main national competition venue and it's a really busy stadium so it would have been a tragedy if Grangemouth had closed. 'Our chief executive, Colin Hutchison, put in a power of work and we got very good support from Falkirk Council as well as sportscotland and I think that was because Grangemouth is such a significant stadium for athletics both nationally and locally. 'But I don't think though that there's enough recognition at government level of the importance of these kind of facilities, and it's not just athletics facilities, it's swimming pools, hockey pitches and the rest. 'It goes back to the point that the reason athletics has been so successful in recent years is because of the foundations that are in place and facilities are a big part of that strong foundation. The danger for so many sports is that the foundations are starting to become shaky I don't think, at government level, there's a strong enough recognition of the importance of these facilities. 'Yes, these venues are important from a sporting perspective but I also think they're hugely significant in a societal sense for things like health and well-being and so I would like to see a change in the government's attitude towards this.' It is, justifiably, Scotland's current crop of world-class athletes such as Laura Muir, Josh Kerr, Eilish McColgan and Jake Wightman who dominate the media coverage afforded to athletics but given these athletes are all in their late-twenties and beyond, it's understandable that the question has begun to be asked as to who, if anyone, is going to fill the boots of these individuals when they inevitably retire. Ovens, however, is quietly confident that there is a wave of athletes coming through the ranks who will ably back-up the success Kerr, Muir et al have so regularly achieved on the global stage and particularly with the 2026 Commonwealth Games in Glasgow just 14 months away, he is keen for some of Scotland's younger athletes to begin to make their presence felt on the international stage. 'This summer, I'm really looking forward to seeing Scottish athletes achieve the qualifying times for next year's Commonwealth Games and I'm looking forward to seeing who's going to emerge,' he says. 'There's Sarah Tait, Brodie Young and Rebecca Grieve who are all out in America and are edging towards world class and there's also the sprinter Dean Patterson who's developing very well so there's a list of names who are looking very exciting. We've got very good depth and so that talent coming through, combined with the fact they can look up to these world-class athletes, makes me feel very optimistic for the future.' First thing's first, though, and before the Commonwealth Games there's this year's World Championships in Tokyo in September. Scottish athletes have enjoyed remarkable success at recent editions of the event, including two 1500m world champions in the shape of Wightman in 2022 and Kerr in 2023 and while Ovens would never be complacent about extending Scotland's medal-winning streak at major events, he remains quietly confident of yet more success this summer. 'We can never take for granted how many medals Scottish athletes have won in recent years,' he says. 'Having said that, there is yet another excellent chance this season of more silverware. 'I'd love to see Jemma Reekie get a gold medal and I'd love to see any of Jake (Wightman), Josh (Kerr) and Neil (Gourley) get a medal and continue that run in the 1500 meters. 'I'm confident that we will get some silverware at the World Champs.'
New York Times
26-04-2025
- New York Times
UK Athletics launches campaign for London to host 2029 World Athletics Championships
A campaign has been launched to stage the 2029 World Athletics Championships in London. The UK hosted the World Championships for the first time in 2017, when London staged the games — five years on from the 2012 Olympics in the capital city. UK Sport and UK Athletics have concluded a year-long feasibility study into London hosting the 2029 event, which they say 'projects a record-breaking economic and social impact of more than £400million'. Advertisement The campaign has been launched on the day of the 2025 London Marathon, which has over 56,000 participants. Any interested host city must lodge a formal expression of interest to World Athletics by September this year, with London's hopes contingent on securing £45m in government funding. Glasgow hosted the World Indoor Championships in 2024, while Birmingham will host the 2026 European Athletics Championships. The 2025 outdoor World Championships will be held in Tokyo, Japan before the 2027 edition takes place in Beijing, China. 'London 2017 showed the world what this city and this country can do,' said Dame Denise Lewis, president of UK Athletics. 'It was an incredible example of how we can unite behind a vision — full stadiums, global energy, and a lasting impact. I was proud to help bring that event to life, and I know we can do it again in 2029.' Lewis also spoke of the role of Athletic Ventures — a joint venture comprising UK Athletics, The Great Run Company and London Marathon Events — which she claims 'aims to nearly triple' any economic value of hosting a major event. 'We're not just planning a championship — we're shaping a new model for delivering major events in this country,' said Lewis. 'One designed to create long-term impact and lasting return.' (Rainer Jensen/picture alliance via Getty Images)
New York Times
30-03-2025
- New York Times
Jeremiah Azu: My Golds In My Words
Even as a European champion, Jeremiah Azu is relatively unknown. In the pre-event press conference for the World Indoor Championships in Nanjing, China, earlier this month, one reporter asked Azu if he was indeed the 'fastest accountant in the world'. They had confused him with fellow British sprinter Eugene Amo-Dadzie. 'Wrong guy,' Azu responded. Advertisement The 23-year-old arrived in Nanjing in fine form. He retained his British 60m title at the end of February, equalling a personal best of 6.56s and winning with daylight between him and the rest despite the short distance of the race. Azu hit the crashmat at the end of the straight so hard, he bounced off it and fell over. Two weeks later, he cracked the 6.5s barrier for the first time, adding the European 60m title with a 6.49s in Apeldoorn, the Netherlands. His performance there was a masterclass in navigating through the rounds, going quicker in the semi-finals than in the heats and then delivering a personal best in the final. He then ran an identical time in the World Championships final, winning by one-tenth of a second, ahead of talented Australian youngster Lachlan Kennedy (who, with an outdoor 60m PB and national record 6.43s from January, had the world-leading time coming into the competition). It made Azu the first male Briton to be 60m world champion since Richard Kilty in 2014, and he is the fifth athlete this millennium to hold the European and world 60m titles simultaneously — three of the other four are also Brits: Kilty, Dwain Chambers and Jason Gardener, plus Lamont Marcell Jacobs of Italy. A week after he took the world title, Azu sat down with The Athletic at the Alexander Stadium in Birmingham, as part of a media event for the 2026 European Championships being staged at that venue, which were then 500 days out. It was full-circle for Azu to be back there with European and world titles to his name. In 2022, at the Commonwealth Games, the Welshman raced his first senior international final at that stadium, coming fifth in the 100m. That a 20-minute conversation stems from two minutes of video — showing every angle of the European and world finals — shows Azu is as passionate and attentive to performance details as he is fast. This is the story of Jeremiah Azu's gold medals, in his own words. He has not, as I suggest, had videos of these finals on a loop to revel in glory. Azu has rewatched them, but 'more just to see where I could have gone better'. He describes that European final as 'probably one of my cleanest races ever, a lot cleaner than World Champs — that one was a bit messy, a lot of head movement'. Advertisement The Worlds were his third Championships in the space of a month, so the mental and physical fatigue of going through the rounds were compounding. 'It's hard to say if I could have gone faster if it was cleaner, but I think we had between 6.45 and 6.47 as times I could have run. It's not a million miles off,' he says. 'My training is very much set up to run faster at the championships. I'm always going to have that bit more in the final. Everyone's got crazy-fast training PBs, but when it actually matters, there's pressure. I kind of enjoy it. Sometimes I think to myself, 'Can you actually handle this?'. I know I can.' The 'bit more' that Azu references is not just about conditioning, but also the mechanics of finishing. Athletes are measured from the point their torso crosses the finish line, so if form degrades and their dip comes too soon, they can end up with a different colour medal — or none at all. 'That's the difference,' he says, rewatching the World Championship final, pointing out that Kennedy 'might be in front of me' with 10m to go. 'It's hard to tell.' The man himself 🤩 Jeremiah Azu everybody 👏👏@ — Team GB (@TeamGB) March 21, 2025 'You can only dip on your last step, any more than that and you slow down,' he explains. 'I'm still upright and then I've gone, one step, and it's taken me through the line. I've always been good at timing my dips, I've never really trained it.' Composure mattered, as did tactics, which might sound surprising for a race that lasts less than seven seconds. Azu says he comes off 'autopilot' halfway through. 'Once I get out of the drive (phase, which is when the athlete is accelerating to top speed), that's when I become aware. Even if I try and think back, it's just blank, and then I wake up at 30 metres.' Advertisement By then, 'it's just staying tall, making sure my feet are landing underneath me and not panicking'. He knew that Eloy Benitez, the Puerto Rican inside him in lane five, was likely to DNF. He had been stretching his calf beforehand in the call room and asked Azu to share some Tiger Balm pain reliever, which he did. 'I knew that gap was going to appear, and I knew these two (in the outside lanes to his right) had run super-fast in the first two rounds, so they had nothing left. I was expecting to be by myself. At this point (45m in), I couldn't really see anyone (to my left), because they were all in a line.' The other two medallists came from lanes two and three, to Azu's left, with 21-year-old Kennedy taking silver and South Africa's Akani Simbine, 31, finally getting an individual global medal, the bronze. 'I just knew not to panic because the line's going to come to me. I don't need to try to get to the line.' Azu says. 'That's what took the win, we're talking about the width of paper.' Did he have an idea crossing the line how fast he had gone? 'I had a glance at the clock just before I hit the pads, and I saw 6.50 and was like, 'Nah, it's quicker than that'. Obviously, 6.49 and 6.50 are the same thing, but you just want to go under it. 'It's funny, because I was more sure that I'd won this than the Europeans, and the Europeans was a bigger gap (to second place).' Azu thought he had been run out of the gold medal in that European final by the fast-finishing Henrik Larsson, who was to his right. Larsson finished second, in a Swedish record 6.52s, but was three-tenths back on Azu. As a smaller sprinter — think Christian Coleman, Nesta Carter or Su Bingtian — Azu's blockwork is naturally superior to his top-end mechanics. He can turn his feet over quicker because shorter limbs move faster. 'My biggest area to improve is my transition phase,' he says, after rewatching both finals. Advertisement 'It's getting better, so it's working out how to go from staying on the ground (when accelerating) to coming off the ground,' he explains. This is the middle section of the race — from 30m onwards — when athletes hit top speed before starting to decelerate. 'There's a certain position you need to be in, because you can't just come straight up — you will lose all that momentum,' Azu says. 'It's kind of like an aeroplane take-off. Once I'm in my max speed, it's clockwork. After 40, 50 metres, you can't just go quicker, you've got to maintain.' The real magic of Azu's races is not the finish but the start. He is talkative to the TV cameras, though not quite to the extent of 2024 Olympic 100m champion Noah Lyles of the United States, because it helps settle nerves. 'If people watched me at training, they'd see the same thing,' Azu explains. 'So why would I come here and do anything different? 'On the line, it just comes to me. I don't like to pre-rehearse stuff. I'm not thinking about what I'm about to do, because you can get caught up in thinking, 'This is a European final/a World final, I've dreamed about this moment'. I'm just not there (mentally) for that moment, until they say 'Set'. Especially with the crowd. You can get overwhelmed if you think about them.' A post shared by AZOOM (@jeremiahazu) He cites the 100m at the London Diamond League last July as an example of the occasion getting to him: 'I was like, 'I need to do this for the fans'. I ran OK, but (with) way too much pressure, and I didn't need that — there's no point adding that. It's stuff you learn from.' He came seventh out of eight in a stacked field that day, running 10.08 seconds in a race where five athletes went sub-10s and three broke the 9.9 barrier. Azu's reaction times are phenomenal. At those World Championships, he was the fastest to react of 58 athletes in the heats (0.111 seconds), the second-fastest of 24 in the semis (0.129), and only Kennedy got out the blocks quicker in the final. Advertisement 'Before every session, we do three thirties (30m sprints) with reaction,' Azu says. 'So we do train it, unintentionally, because every time I race I'm going to have to react (to the gun). It's a massive part of it.' He is often the last to rise into the set position before the race begins but one of the best over the first three steps. 'I almost feel like I'm hovering over the floor. It's such a specific movement,' he elaborates. Azu scrubs through a reverse, slow-motion angle of the European indoors' final as he explains the next part. 'I try to keep my feet as low as possible for the first three steps. After that, it's really just hitting the floor as hard as possible.' Here he works on being 'aggressive. In the acceleration (phase), you need to be on the ground. If you're not, you are not going fast.' Power can only be generated when the athlete's feet are on the floor, so faster steps are better. Part of the challenge in Nanjing was the track, which Azu said felt 'very new. So I couldn't start the way I normally do. Normally, my feet are almost touching the floor, but I had to lift, because, in the heats, I started and I got caught up on the track because it's so grippy. So it was slowing me down.' There is a lazy narrative to weave about a redemption arc after Azu false-started in the 100m heats at the Olympics in Paris last August. It meant he lost the chance to shine individually on that stage, but he quickly put that behind him to lead off the 4x100m relay heats and final. Great Britain finished third, their first men's medal in that event for 24 years. Azu was one of only 13 British athletes sent to Nanjing (with no relay squads) — a much smaller track-and-field team than the 63 who went to Paris. This is natural for an indoor World Championship, which coaches see more as a launchpad for the outdoor season than an event to peak for, on the other side of the globe. Consequently, the typical American and Jamaican big hitters were also absent, and Azu seized the opportunity. Neil Gourley, who won 1,500m silver at the World Indoors, was Team GB captain, and used Azu as a source of inspiration. 'He swore a lot,' Azu jokes. 'He mentioned me in the speech and said, 'I'm sure you woke up on that day (European 60m final) and thought, 'let's do something extraordinary'.' 'To have your teammates believing in you, saying that I'm going to win to the press, it allows you to win and fills you with confidence.' I tell Azu that I always dislike media folk asking athletes 'What's next?' after they win a medal — let alone two titles — and he laughs, more than prepared to speak about his ambitions to get close to Zharnel Hughes' 100m British record of 9.83 seconds. Azu left Marco Airale's Italy-based training group last December and went back to Helen James, who coached him in Cardiff during his teenage years. Advertisement 'We've still got loads of time to work on stuff,' he says. 'It's even more exciting, because I've run fast in 100m the last couple of years (he became the first Welshman to run a wind-legal sub-10 seconds 100m last May), but my 60m and 200m just didn't improve. 'So to come back (this year) and instantly run a 60m PB, it just shows that we're making the right decisions.' Azu says the sub 9.9s barrier for 100m is 'where we want to be. There, you're really competitive. I know I'm capable, I want to be in that mix. If you can run 6.5s (for 60m) you can run 9.9s (for 100m),' he adds, explaining sprinting exchange rates. 'If you can run 6.4s, you can run 9.8s. In the summer, my 60m will be better because I'm not trying to get to 60m.' The target is to be splitting under 6.45s for 60m en route to a fast 100m — that quality of start would put him in medal contention. 'All I want to do is be consistent,' Azu says, believing that, if he consistently breaks 10s this outdoor season, 'I know my one-off is going to be 9.8 and who knows what the one-off of that could be. 'It'll be exciting this summer.'
