by Larry Eder
Laura Muir, Stockholm DL, 2014, photo by PhotoRun.net
Laura Muir placed fifth in the World Champs 1,500 meters, in a race that was part roller derby, and then, run as fast as you can for 800 meters. Alex Mills writes about Laura’s pleasure on a season ending well.
She may not have won a medal but yesterday was a great day for Laura Muir. The Scottish athlete ran a classy race in the women’s 1500m final to prove herself on the global stage by finishing an excellent 5th place at the world championships, finally putting her major championship troubles to bed.
“It felt great, I left last year really frustrated because I knew I could run so much better than what I showed at championships so it feels great to have come here and run so well.” she said afterwards.
Completing an already incredible season that included that brilliant front running win at the Oslo Diamond League, the awesome 3:58.66 in Monaco to go 2nd on the British all-time lists and a swift 2:00.42 800m at the Birmingham Diamond League in style, Muir showed just how much speed she had as she ran out of her skin in the final lap of last night’s epic race to climb from 7th to 5th place in the final 200m. Going past reigning champion Abeba Aregawi and American record holder with ease, to finish just two seconds off the podium.
Had she not tried her best to stay with gold medallist Genzebe Dibaba as the Ethiopian went through the penultimate lap in 57 seconds, things might have been even better for the athlete. Yet after quite possibly running a 800m PB in the process of her final two laps, as the pace changed from a pedestrian 2:10 for the first 700m to 1:57.2 for the last 800m, you have to commend the Brit for the way she responded to the sudden change of tactics in her first ever senior final.
Unsurprisingly despite missing out on a medal, Muir was delighted with her performance: “I’m really pleased, that was such a tough field I think any other year I probably would have medalled so to come 5th and I’m really happy.”
As for the tactical nature of the race she said: “I was expecting it to be honest it’s a championship final and there’s just so many girls in there you just don’t now who’s going to do what, I was prepared for a fast race or a slow race, it was just a case of staying out of trouble.”
“It felt great, I left last year really frustrated because I knew I could run so much better than what I showed at championships so it feels great to have come here and run so well.”
Now it’s seems safe to say that this performance should be the springboard for Muir to go on and improve ever further to become a true great of British distance running, especially if her raw speed last night is anything to go by. So with Rio 2016 less then 12 months away she says her success in Beijing will help a lot: “This was the first time I’ve done three rounds so to do have done three and to have got through each round really well, it gives great preparation and confidence for next year.”
