byStuart Weir
Jessie Knight, photo by Getty Images / British Athletics
Stuart Weir, after enjoying 4 amazing hours of athletics, wrote seven pieces on the magnifiscent meet that was Glasgow. This is his fifth! What do I enjoy about Stuart? Stuart’s writing elicits pictures, and fills in the pieces that one does not find in the TV broadcast. It is like radio for my mind. One is able to use their imagination to add to the wondrous events we cover in athletics.
400/800/1500
Running the 400 indoors is always hazardous with the tight bends and athletes jockeying for position. The women’s 400m field consisted of 2 Jamaicans, 2 Poles, one from Netherlands and one from Britain. Just after the break from lanes, Stefenie Ann McPherson and her compatriot, the hurdler, Janieve Russell, tangled and both fell. Russell got up and finished the race in 1m 00.87. Perversely, as it was her first ever indoor 400, she registered a PR.
Jessie Knight battles Poland’s NR holder/ Euro Champ, Justyna Swiety-Ersetic, photo by Getty Images / British Athletics
Jessie Knight from GB took the lead at the end of the first lap and held off all-comers for a magnificent and unexpected win in 51.57 from Justyna Swiety-Ersetic (51.68). An excited Knight said: “That was just amazing. I got a stadium record and being on that start list, on paper I should have been last. I had to give it everything and when I broke I knew I couldn’t afford to lose it. I ran 52.2s last week and won by comfortably but I was strong at the end. My coach puts a really strong programme together and it’s paying off because of the amount of over-training I’m doing and it shows hard work pays off”.
The finish of the 400m: Jessie Knight over Justyna Swiety-Ersetic, photo by Getty Images / British Athletics
In the other races, Akeem Bloomfield (Jamaica) just held off Ogi Igbokwe (USA) to win the 400 in 46.20.
Adam Kszczot (Poland) won the 800 in 1:46.34 from Cornelius Tuwei of Kenya. GB took third, fourth and fifth with Guy Learmonth, Josh Kerr and Eliot Giles.
Bethwell Birgen (Kenya) took the men’s 1500m in 3:36.22 with Marcin Lewandowski (Poland) second. Piers Copeland was the first GB athlete home in fourth in 3:38.81, a PR with 20 year old, George Mills sixth in 3:39.25, another PR.
