World Athletics Championships: Mo Farah wins 5,000 metres gold in Beijing

Double trouble: Farah followed up his 10,000 metres triumph by storming to gold
(Andy Lyons/Getty Images)
Guy Aspin29 August 2015

Mo Farah wrote his name into the record books by completing a hat-trick of long-distance doubles at global championships by retaining his world 5,000 metres title in Beijing.

The 32-year-old followed up his 10,000 metres triumph by storming to gold over the shorter distance to rack up his seventh straight global crown - an unprecedented period of domination.

The slow early pace, set by Farah's team-mate Tom Farrell at the front early on, played into his hands and he took advantage, unleashing his devastating kick past Kenya's Caleb Mwangangi Ndiku in the final 150m to cross the line a comfortable winner in 13 minutes 50.38 seconds.

The Kenyans had worked as a team in the 10,000m to try to neutralise Farah's finishing speed and, although it did not work, it was expected his rivals would try something similar again.

Instead the early pace was slow, Farah loitering at the back.

He took closer order with seven laps to go and then moved on to the shoulder of Imane Merga as the Ethiopian hit the front with three laps to go.

Ndiku did at least try to pose a problem for the Briton, moving up a gear in a long bid for home with 800m remaining and finally stretching out the field.

But Farah is the master at fast finishing and he went with the Kenyan before bursting past him as they headed into the home straight for the final time.

Ndiku had no answer and had to dig in to hold on for silver in 13mins 51.75secs.

Ethiopia's Hagos Gebrhiwet took bronze, while Farrell ended up 15th.

Create a FREE account to continue reading

eros

Registration is a free and easy way to support our journalism.

Join our community where you can: comment on stories; sign up to newsletters; enter competitions and access content on our app.

Your email address

Must be at least 6 characters, include an upper and lower case character and a number

You must be at least 18 years old to create an account

* Required fields

Already have an account? SIGN IN

By clicking Create Account you confirm that your data has been entered correctly and you have read and agree to our Terms of use , Cookie policy and Privacy policy .

This site is protected by reCAPTCHA and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.

Thank you for registering

Please refresh the page or navigate to another page on the site to be automatically logged in