HHH hosts BMC meeting, more records herald new era for UK athletics

In 2022, Tooting Bec Athletics Track was saved from inexorable decline following a successful grassroots campaign. Funding for resurfacing of the track was provided by Wandsworth Council and breathed new life into one of London’s iconic running venues. In the two years since, athletics has thrived in Tooting and at local club Herne Hill Harriers. This is due, in part, to the boom in running since the pandemic. The sport is more popular than it has been for many years – the evidence is clear to see online, on London’s streets and commons and, indeed, on Tooting Track. Efforts to harness this surge in interest at the elite level are underway, to translate running as a lifestyle choice into running as a sport that captures the public’s imagination at the highest level. In the 1980s, world-class rivalries between Steve Ovett, Sebastian Coe and Steve Cram placed athletics at the top of UK sports headlines. Crystal Palace, just four miles from Tooting, was at the centre of this golden age. As Crystal Palace National Sports Centre undergoes its own regeneration, Tooting has sought to kickstart a new era in the spotlight for professional athletics.

Nick Griggs

Enter MarketAxess Tooting BMC*, now in the second year of its sponsorship arrangement. With an £8,000 prize fund on offer, and a burgeoning reputation following a 2023 event strewn with records, the 2024 edition of Tooting BMC provided another historic night in middle-distance running in the UK. On 24 July, athletes from around the world set the tone ahead of the Paris Olympics. Nine of these athletes had raced in the London Diamond League days earlier, while others will go on to compete for the highest honours in the French capital.   

Georgie Grgec of HHH

Over the course of the evening, runners raced over 800m, 1500m and 3000m. A remarkable 46 per cent of 240 athletes ran personal best times.

In the women’s 800m, Herne Hill Harriers’ Tokyo Olympian Katie Snowden eased away from the field on the home straight to win in 2:01.67. In the men’s 800m, Justin Davies ran a rapid 1:46.26 ground record to take the prize money. In the women’s and men’s 3000m events, sub-9:00 and sub-8:00 times were achieved by A race winners Georgie Grgec, who represented New Zealand at the World Cross Country Championships in 2024 and ran a ground record at Tooting, and Efrem Gidey. In the women’s 1500m, Kate Axford also ran a ground record in 4:10.06.

In the men’s 1500m, Nick Griggs, a 19-year-old Northern Irishman, took the headlines – literally, with this report by the BBC. Griggs, a hugely exciting prospect who showed his world-class potential by pipping the 2023 winner, New Zealand’s Sam Tanner. Although Tanner, who will compete in the Olympics, is returning to racing after a break, it was an extremely impressive run by Griggs. His time of 3:35.04 bettered Tanner’s BMC all-comers record, set at Tooting BMC in 2023, by 0.11 seconds.

While the front of the men’s 1500m A race provided obvious excitement, those behind Griggs and Tanner delivered some similarly astonishing stats. All 12 finishers ran quicker than 3:38. In the 1500m B race, a further seven athletes ran under 3:40. In the C race, Australian Jaryd Clifford ran just outside his para-athletics world record before he heads to Paris to compete for gold. The winner of the C race, Baldvin Magnusson, set an Icelandic record in 3:39.90. The results from Tooting are reverberating in Reykjavik. In two years, Tooting BMC now holds 15 of the 20 fastest men’s 1500m times in the BMC’s 61-year history.

On social media, news of the event reached hundreds of thousands and effusive feedback from participants has set Tooting BMC’s sights on building on the event’s success in 2025.

As attention now turns to Paris, homegrown medal hopefuls Josh Kerr and Keely Hodgkinson look set to raise the profile of British athletics further. The efforts to propel the sport in the UK will be helped by international success, rivalries between athletes like Kerr and Jakob Ingebrigtsen, and investment in prize money and establishing top events. London Diamond League brought 60,000 spectators to the capital, confirming the British public’s interest in the sport. While Tooting Track has a slightly smaller capacity than the London Stadium, there are clear signs that athletics is returning to its previous prominence. More events like Tooting BMC will help – and should serve as a blueprint for the bottom-up development of elite athletics.

The full results for MarketAxess Tooting BMC can be found here.

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