 |
| European 5000m champion Mo Farah of Great Britain is confident of defending his title in Helsinki on Wednesday. |
Mo Farah and history. What is it about this athlete and those record books?
Two years ago in Barcelona, Farah became the first Briton to win a European gold medal in the 10,000 metres, 12 months ago in Daegu he became the first British man to win a world title at 5000m and now he is back in a stadium which has long-distance legend steeped into its every brick and mortar.
Farah, 29, is the favourite for the opening final of these European Athletics Championships in Helsinki on Wednesday evening when he brings all the confidence and experience he has gained since Barcelona to a city where Emil Zatopek ran into Olympic folklore 60 years ago.
Naturally so much has changed in those six decades since Czechoslovakian Zatopek produced the astonishing feat of winning the 5000m, 10,000m and marathon in a matter of days.
What remains is the core of the magnificent Olympic Stadium where it is so easy to visualise Zatopek landing an achievement which is unlikely to ever be matched.
However humble he is – and no matter what he has won Farah has remained as down-to-earth as he can be – the British star does not need reminding the footsteps he is following in.
Now he is on the precipice of greatness. In just over a month, Farah will attempt to win the 10,000m and then the 5000m at the Olympics in London.
Helsinki was not always on the agenda but the European Championships should now embrace what could be the final time one of the new breed of distance superstars takes to its track.
So much points to Farah, who also triumphed in the 10,000m in Barcelona, moving to the marathon after this summer's exploits.
As David Bedford, the former world 10,000m record-holder and, until this April, the race director of the London Marathon, said: 'Mo has the credentials to mix it with the top guys over the 26.2 miles. He has an economical running style, a good solid stride-length and looks incredibly ¬natural on the roads.
'He doesn't carry a lot of weight and still has not done massive mileage. He has enough speed to win a big city marathon.'
When Farah won the long-distance double in Barcelona, he became only the fifth man to achieve that success at the European Athletics Championships and the first since Italian Salvatore Antibo in Split in 1990. Of the others, Zatopek was among them, winning both events at the 4th European Athletics Championships in Belgium in 1950.
But tomorrow Farah will resume a rivalry which has brought him joy and despair.
In 2006, he was beaten to 5000m European gold by Spain's Jesus Espana by just 0.09 of a second in Gothenburg before reversing those placings in Barcelona.
His 12:56.98 from Eugene, Oregon, last month makes him a clear favourite to retain his title in Helsinki in a season where Espana has not yet run the distance.
But as Farah learned from Daegu, where unexpected Ethiopian Ibrahim Jeilan pipped him to 10,000m gold, it is not all about the names he knows.
'If you don't pace yourself, if you don't cover every move, something can happen and always there are new guys coming through no matter what,' said Farah.
'In Daegu I was not even thinking about Ibrahim Jeila, I was thinking about the other guy who came third, Merga , that is the guy I had raced all season and this guy I have never raced.
'It is not going to be easy (in Helsinki), it is not going to be a walk in the park.'
Germany's Arne Gabius is second behind Farah on the season's lists with13:13.43, a personal best, while Frenchman Yogan Durand has run 13:17.90.
But Farah is in that rich vein of form where his presence on the start-line alone is dominance enough, never mind what happens when the gun fires.