Semi-final agony for Mark English at World Indoor Championships

A global final at senior level continues to elude Mark English, who felt a familiar agony in Toruń.

The Finn Valley AC athlete bowed out of the World Athletics Indoor Championships at the semi-final phase on Saturday.

English was fourth in his 800m semi in 1:46.70, the race getting away from him in the last 100m.

The five-time European medallist moved from fifth to first with about 300m left at Kujawsko-Pomorska Arena Toruń.

English took the bell in front, but was unable to get around those in front down the last 50m.

On Friday afternoon, English came through his heat in 1:46.42, winning with relative comfort after pushing the button around 300m from the finish.

The 33-year-old Letterkenny native was just 0.23 of a second off Tatsunami Clay from Japan, who was second in 1:46.47 while Peter Bol of Australia won the heat in 1:46.21.

Small margins, but a gaping hole from where English wanted - and needed - to be and was the picture of dejection as he made his way off the track and into the Polish afternoon. 

English himself observed after his heat that “everyone feels that they’ve got a chance of making it”.

The gold medal favourite Eliott Crestan had gone a step further on Friday, the Belgian saying: “I would say any one of maybe 10 people can win”.

Indeed, it was hard to argue, a thin blanket covering the bests - and the possibilities - for so many in the field.

So it proved, with Navasky Anderson from Jamaica, a finalist at last year’s World Championships in Tokyo, nosing ahead of English, but also bowing out.

After the 2024 Olympic Games in Tokyo, English linked up with coach Justin Rinaldi, himself a former 800m runner who leads out the Fast 8 Track Club.

The Rinaldi-coached Peter Bol, an Australian racing indoors for only the fourth time in his career, booked his place in the final, while rising American star Cooper Lutkenhaus won the second semi in 1:44.29 with Crestan safely through from the third semi, winning in 1:45.71.

After an agonising World Championships in Tokyo last year, English came back with a renewed pep in his step.

After a tough period of altitude training in the Sierra Nevada mountains, English lowered the Irish indoor 800m twice in swift succession - falling to 1:44.23 in Ostrava at a World Indoor Tour gold meet - also setting a new 600m mark in the process.

English didn’t take part in the National Senior Indoors, instead staying at his Sierra Nevada camp to hone in on Poland.

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“When you’re peaking for a lot of races, sometimes you can lose that bit of fitness,” he explained after his heat. “I probably learned that from last year…I’ve got to take it each round at a time.”

Alas, there will be no final this weekend for English, who will move on now to the outdoor campaign.