Sebastian Coe has urged Laura Muir to take her rivals into the “killing zone” as the student vet prepares for the start of her World Championships campaign.
The retirement of Jessica Ennis-Hill and Greg Rutherford’s injury means that Muir, who runs in the 1,500m heats tonight, has been fast-tracked to a billing as one of Britain’s best hopes. Her championship record is modest — seventh at last year’s Olympics and fifth at the 2015 World Championships leavened by two European indoor titles this spring — but her best time of 3min 55.22sec means that only one woman has run a faster 1,500m this century.
As a two-times Olympic champion over the distance, the IAAF president is well-placed to judge her. “She is a brave runner,” Coe told The Times. “Running from the front is a tactic because you can take people into the killing zone quickly and make it hurt.” Coe also says Muir has got her training right as she plans to double up in the 5,000m. “It’s not dissimilar to the stuff I did. If you get your training right at 1,500 then, with a little more endurance work, the jump to the 5,000 is not such a tall order.”
Three years ago Muir was disconsolate after being tripped at her home Commonwealth Games in Glasgow, before failing to make the final at the European Championships in Zurich. “I sat with her and told her she had chosen the toughest sport to medal in and probably the toughest distance, and, secondly, she had picked the toughest degree course in the UK,” Coe said.
“Being a vet means farms at 4am and horses with colic. She has challenged herself physically and mentally in a way very few athletes do.”
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Coe, though, believes 1,500m is more “forgiving” than 800m, where you need “the leg speed of a world-class 400m runner, the endurance of a distance runner and an on-board computer to think exit strategies moments before someone steps in front of you”. “You can’t make a mistake and recover in the 800, but in the 1,500 you can,” he said.