Josh Kerr’s summer of miracle and wonder continued in front of his adoring home fans as he added a Commonwealth gold medal in the mile to his glittering collection.
- Josh Kerr surged with 250m to go, powering clear to gold in the mile in 3:54.12.
- High-quality final featured three of past four world 1500m champions including Timothy Cheruiyot and Jake Wightman; Cam Myers took silver.
- Slow early pace (59s first lap, 2:02 halfway) prompted aggressive positioning; Josh Kerr barged rivals, moved into third at the bell then accelerated decisively.
In a slowly run race that frequently resembled funfair dodgems, Kerr made his move with 250m to go before eviscerating a high-quality field to take gold in 3:54.12.
There were some who feared that Kerr might have an emotional hangover after shattering the world mile record a fortnight ago. Others believed that if it turned into a sprint the 28-year-old might be vulnerable. So much for that. He destroyed them all.
“It means everything,” Kerr said afterwards. “It doesn’t get any better than this. This is absolutely incredible. To do it in front of a Scottish crowd where I learned how to race. I came here week after week growing up as a kid.”
There has been plenty of talk about diluted fields at these Games. But this was a double whipped cream of a final, containing three of the past four world 1500m champions – Timothy Cheruiyot, Jake Wightman and Kerr – as well as the 20-year-old Australian wunderkind Cam Myers.
Earlier this week, Myers was hailed as the “future of the sport” by Wightman. But he had no answer to Kerr’s injection of pace, and while he fought hard he had to settle for silver in 3:55.26, with Cheruiyot taking bronze.
But before that dazzling finish Kerr had to employ a few rough-house tactics along the way. A couple of times he barged other athletes. On another occasion he looked to step off the track.
And no wonder, given the first lap was run in a sluggish 59 seconds, and they were through halfway in a painfully slow 2:02.
It was now a case of who was going to blink first. With 500m to go Kerr was poorly positioned but he moved up behind Cheruiyot and Myers into third at the bell before striking hard – and decisively – soon after. Wightman was the only one to go with him but fizzled out to finish sixth.
“When you’re running that slow, your job is not to waste energy and I did that there,” said Kerr. “I knew an opportunity would open up. Jake was on the outside and he’s such a great closer. But I had enough energy to put a gap on him in the last 200m.
“London was a big stress, pushing my body to the extreme limit. Doing a championship race is a nice clean of the palate, using your brain instead of your body. It’s how I love to race.”
Sebastian Coe, the president of World Athletics, came up with the idea of restoring the mile to the Commonwealth Games. He knew there was something mythical and magical about the distance. And so the umbilical cord that was wrongly ripped up after 1966 after a legendary roll call of winners was rightly restored.
Roger Bannister, Herb Elliott, Peter Snell, Kip Keino … and now Josh Kerr. That is some list. And it was some victory too.
