EILISH MCCOLGAN won a glorious gold medal on the track for Team Scotland, winning the 10,000m to become Commonwealth champion and emulating her mum who achieved the same feat over three decades ago.
McColgan’s gold is Scotland’s first in athletics at Birmingham 2022 and the 31-year-old did it in style.
For almost a year, McColgan has been in scintillating form, breaking numerous Scottish, British and European records over several distances but a string of set-backs including a bout of Covid, laryngitis and a tweaked hamstring in recent months meant her preparation for these Commonwealth Games was far from ideal.
A tenth place in the 10,000m at the recent World Championships indicated she was getting back to full fitness and she was amongst the pre-race favourites for a medal at the Alexander Stadium last night but with the Kenyan pair of Irene Cheptai and Sheila Kiprotich, England’s Jess Judd as well as defending champion, Stella Chesang from Uganda also on the start line, a place on the podium was far from assured for the Scot.
The early stages of the race panned out well for McColgan, who is the quickest 5000m runner in the field, with the first thousand metres of the final run at an especially slow place.
As things progressed, McColgan took the race on, going to the front and she whittled the field down to her and the two Kenyan women, who are better known for their exploits on the road than the track but are accomplished championship performers nevertheless.
With 1000m to go, Kiprotech became hampered by an injury and dropped back, with McColgan and Cheptai opening up an unassailable gap between themselves and the rest.
At the bell, Cheptai tried to kick for home but she could not shake McColgan who remained steadfastly on her shoulder and with around 60m to go, the Scot put in a burst of pace that left the Kenyan in her wake to take gold in a new Commonwealth Games record of 30 minutes 48.60 seconds.
It is McColgan’s first major championships gold medal, emulating her mum, Liz’s, 10,000m victory at the 1986 and 1990 Commonwealth Games.
It was her mum who was amongst the first to congratulate McColgan on her win, with both mother and daughter in tears at the enormity of the Dundonian’s achievement and in the immediate aftermath, McColgan admitted she was close to speechless at her win which came in her third Commonwealth Games and her fourth different discipline following her appearances in the 1500m, steeplechase and 5000m over the past two Games.
“It’s been such an up and down year with Covid and another illness and a couple of niggles at the wrong time. I knew the fitness was somewhere in me but I couldn’t have asked for any more tonight. To have my family here and the crowd were incredible, the noise was vibrating through my entire body,” she said.
“I wanted it so bad. I know those two (Kenyan) ladies from the road circuit so I know they’re strong and I knew they’d put in bursts to try and break up the pace but I knew if I could stay with them, I could close well so it’s an absolute dream.
“It’s so special. I’ve finally found an event that suits me and to win it is incredible.
“I was ready to win a medal here but you could see over the last 100m how much I wanted gold and I can’t even put into words how I feel.”
Guy Learmonth also showed some impressive form, finishing second in his heat of the 800m in 1 minute 49.15 seconds to qualify for Sunday’s final.
Another final appearance, eight years after doing the same at Glasgow 2014, is just reward for the 30-year-old, whose 2021 season was almost completely obliterated by the after-effects of Covid.
“That was a tough heat,” he said.
“A lot of people probably wrote me off with past year I’ve had and people have been kicking me when I’m down but the last four weeks, I’ve got my head together and I proved there what I can do.”
In the women’s 400m, both Nicole Yeargin and Zoey Clark made it safely through to the semi-finals.
Yeargin was first up, finishing third in her heat in 52.52 seconds while Clark was a shade faster, crossing the line in 51.84 seconds to finish seconds in her heat.
Both Adam Thomas and Alisha Rees were in action in the 100m semi-finals but neither could progress with Thomas finishing seventh in his semi in 10.40 seconds and Rees also finishing seventh in 11.47 seconds.
The new Commonwealth sprint champions are Ferdinand Omanyala of Kenya, who won the men’s title in 10.02 seconds and Olympic champion, Elaine Thompson-Herah, who took gold in 10.95 seconds with England’s Daryll Neita taking bronze.
