Saturday’s action at the IAAF World Championships offered further excitement for the British Athletics team as the action moved out onto the roads along the corniche for the men’s marathon.

Fresh from early evening double silver success for the sprint relay teams, GB & NI’s Callum Hawkins (Kilbarchan; Robert Hawkins) took on the 26.2 miles, a championship race he finished an admirable 4^th place in at the London 2017 World Championships, keen to improve upon the British team’s medal collection from Saturday evening.

The Kilbarchan man ran his typically sensible race, sat within the main pack for the first half but pushing on in the second half. He played a pivotal part of the chasing pack targeting the lead group of five that broke away in the second half.

At 35km he made the move to bridge the gap between the two groups and within 2km had taken fifth before striding on to join the leading group of four. Excitement grew when he took the lead in an attempt to reduce his opponents, but the Ethiopian and Kenya challenge proved too strong, with Lelisa Desisa and Mosinet Geremew (ETH) pushing on for the final run in.

Sadly for Hawkins he could not make ground on Amos Kipruto (KEN) for bronze, and the brave effort ended with him crossing the line in 4^th, once again matching his finishing position from 2017. His finishing time  was 2:10.57.

Clearly disappointed, Hawkins recalled his thoughts during the closing stages:

“I maybe settled a bit too much and let them get too much of a gap but it was a huge move Tadesse made just before halfway. At two laps to go I felt great so I just kept pushing and pushing. And then when I caught them I knew I didn’t have a kick, I was just trying to be strong.

“That’s why as soon as I got to them, I hit the front and tried to burn them off but they were just waiting for the kick. At least I burned off one of them!

“I knew this was the pace I’d got and I was trying everything to lift it but I just couldn’t. To be even closer than last time, it’s gutting. I really wanted that medal and that’s what I trained for. But it wasn’t to be on the night.”

British team interest in Sunday’s final world championship session begins at 19:10 local time with the women’s 100m hurdles semi final featuring Cindy Ofili.

British medallists at the IAAF World Championships:

Gold: (2)

Dina Asher-Smith – 200m

Katarina Johnson-Thompson – Heptathlon

Silver: (1)

Dina Asher-Smith – 100m

Men’s 4x100m Relay

Women’s 4x100m Relay

Top-eight finishes:

4th – Callum Hawkins – Marathon

4th – Adam Gemili – 200m

4th – Holly Bradshaw – Pole Vault

4th – Mixed 4x400m relay team

6th – Zharnel Hughes – 100m

7^th – Tom Bosworth – 20km race walk

7^th – Laura Weightman – 5000m