SIR Mo Farah has confirmed the end of his dazzling track career - but will run the London Marathon before deciding whether to retire completely.
Britain’s most decorated athlete was beaten by a club runner on his last appearance, a 10km race on the streets of the capital in May. It led to fevered speculation the 10-time global champion would call it quits rather than risk tarnishing his golden legacy.
Today he admitted: “No, I’m not going back to the track. This is it.”
But Farah, 39, says he cannot walk away from the sport until he knows for sure that every last ounce of stardust has been sprinkled. So he has signed up to run the TCS London Marathon on October 2, and the tune-up London Big Half event a month earlier.
“Do I still have the hunger, am I willing to put in the work and the miles? Yes,” he said. “I still have that fight in me and until you lose it I don't think I should think about retiring.
“But being realistic, can my body do this? I've watched tennis and Andy Murray, the guy still has that fight in him but his body doesn't allow him. I’m still doing sessions normal people can’t do. You still feel you’ve got it but you have to be realistic.
“You’ve done the World Champs, you’ve won medals, are you just going there just to make numbers or are you going there to actually be competitive?”
Farah is at peace with the knowledge that he can no longer cut it at the top end on the track, in the 10,000m and 5,000m events he dominated across two Olympics and four Worlds spanning 2011-2017.
“When I line up I always want to do my best, no matter what kind of race it is,” he added. “As much as I love running and what I do it's not easy competing at a high level.
“You think you’ve still got it because that's our mind at this level. You don't think anything other than you still got it.
“But sometimes you’ve got to take a step back, be realistic. The truth is I am getting on a bit and sometimes your body doesn't allow you to do things. So I’m taking it just one race at a time, trying to prepare right, keep putting the miles and the work in because I love to be competitive with others.
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“But that’s also the reason I'm not going to the World Champs or Europeans this summer. If I can't be competitive with these guys [on the track], there's no point going and making up the numbers.”
There are no shortage of archer experts telling Farah to stop now with his reputation intact but he says that only he can know when the time is right.
“That decision can only come from me, not my manager, not my wife or my kids," he said. "There will be a time, but I don't even know it myself.”
