by Stuart Weir
Muller Indoor Grand Prix, photo from Getty Images/British Athletics
IAAF World Tour Winners: Su Bingtian, Adam Kszczot, Yomif Kejelcha, Christina Manning, Sosthene Moguerara-Taroum, Maria Lasitskene, Beatrice Chepkoech , photo by Getty Images/British Athletics
This is the first of four articles on the Muller Indoor Grand Prix, that was held in Glasgow, Scotland today. An exciting meet and a fine ending to the 2018 IAAF World Tour. Stuart Weir covered the meet for RunBlogRun and we look forward to seeing him in Birmingham in a few days.
The Mὕller Indoor Grand Prix in Glasgow is always a good event. That it is in 2018 part of the Indoor Series with $20,000 prize money available to Series winners adds to its standing. That it takes place a few days before the World Indoor Championship is a further enhancement. The modern venue will host the European Indoors in 2019.
All these factors led to a strong field of international athletes from USA, Jamaica, China, Kenya, Ethiopia and the strong European nations. Olympic and World Champions were not thin on the ground.
A further dimension was that Glasgow is not only in the UK or Great Britain but also in Scotland. In the Commonwealth Games, which take place in Australia in April, there will be separate England and Scotland teams (and Wales and Northern Ireland). To complicate matters yesterday Scotland – against all the odds – beat England in a rugby international.
Thus the home crowd was not just cheering on British Athletes against the world, they were cheering more vociferously for Scottish athletes against the English.
A full programme started with 6 kids’ relays 4 by 200 metres (1 lap of the track) at under 13, 15, 17 ages for boys and girls, with prize money for local clubs at stake. This is a great innovation giving children the chance to run on the track in front of a crowd and to win money to help support their home club.
Then there were 18 events over the next 3 hours 20 minutes. There were 3 women’s field events, 5 races 60-1500 metres and two disability sprints for women and eight events for men. The men’s programme had one field event, six races 60-3000m and a 3000m walk.
With heats of the 60m and 60h there were a total of 20 events, meaning that the programme flowed with no awkward waiting times.
Because Mὕller (a yoghurt producing company) were the main sponsors, there were free yoghurts for the spectators to take home.
