Mo Farah wants London Marathon farewell, eyes coaching 

The four-times Olympic and six-times world champion, 39, will take part in the TCS London Marathon on April 23

Mo Farah wants London Marathon farewell, eyes coaching 
Mo Farah

British runner Mo Farah has admitted 2023 will probably be his last year as an elite athlete and the Olympic Games are now beyond him.

The four-times Olympic and six-times world champion, 39, will take part in the TCS London Marathon on April 23, but conceded his days of taking on the world’s best are gone and his future may be in coaching.

Farah pulled out of last year’s marathon with a hamstring injury four months after he was beaten in the London Vitality 10,000 by Ellis Cross, a self-described “club runner” who had a part-time job in a running shop. Farah was in a reflective mood as he announced his attempt to run his first marathon since finishing eighth in Chicago in 2019.

“I’m not going to the Olympics,” he said. “And 2023 will probably be my last year, but if it came down to it and you are capable of getting picked for your country then I would never turn that down.”

Asked about the prospect of this being his final London Marathon, he said: “It’s just nice to say goodbye and I think it will be quite emotional.”

Plagued by injuries in recent years, he sounded far more realistic than the devastated figure who tried and failed to qualify for the Olympics in 2021. Back then, on a night when he finished a 10,000m at Birmingham University in eighth place and 22 seconds outside the Olympic qualifying time, he pondered the end of his career and said: “No, no, no, no!”

Now he says: “I don’t think there’s many athletes who have gone out for ten years and beaten everybody and won so many major medals. In terms of myself, I’ve done what I needed to do. I just want to go out there and enjoy it.

 “I’m very proud of what I have achieved. I just want to give myself one more shot and see what I can do, but I’ve got nothing to prove. I’ve got nothing in terms of what else I could do.”

If this is the end, Farah will go down as Britain’s greatest runner, due to a decade of dominance. Remarkably, he is still the British record holder in the 1,500m, 3,000m, 5,000m, 10,000m, half-marathon and the marathon. It has not been seamless, though, and he has had to answer questions over his association with Alberto Salazar, the disgraced coach who was banned in 2019 for doping violations.

He also hit the headlines last summer when he told the BBC that he had been trafficked into the UK as a boy and forced into domestic servitude.

Now the married father of four says his future may be to inspire the next generation. “After what I have achieved for my career, I think it’s only right to be able to give it back to the sports, so I see myself as giving back to the youngsters and being a coach of some kind to help youngsters to achieve their dreams.

“I do have my coaching licence. I would love to go down that route and give it back, particularly to British athletes.”

Farah stepped up to the marathon after his final track world title in 2017 with mixed results. He won the Chicago Marathon in 2018 in his best time of 2 hours 5 minutes 11 seconds and was third in London that same year. His last London marathon was four years ago, when he finished fifth.

He says he wants to keep his options open and is taking it a race at a time but he knows the clock is ticking down towards the endgame and is already looking back at his legacy. “It’s just nice to see so many British athletes coming through and taking that path you’ve taken. And particularly Jake Wightman whose World Championship [1,500m] gold was amazing.

 “I think that’s what really inspires me because when I started it was only me, but now there’s a lot of British athletes coming through and believing. British athletes are not doubting themselves now. They’re like, ‘we can mix in with the best’.”

Eilish McColgan will make her marathon debut in London 27 years after her mum, Liz, won the race. The Scot, 32, also pulled out of last year’s marathon after encountering problems with her blood sugar levels after refuelling. McColgan was one of the stars of last year as she won 10,000m gold and 5,000m silver at the Commonwealth Games in Birmingham, as well as 10,000m silver at the European Championships.