Laura Muir hits the ground running and claims new British track record

Laura Muir finished second in the race, behind Faith Kipyegon – with training partner Jemma Reekie, who was fourth, also inside the previous time set by Dame Kelly Holmes.

Olympic 1500m champion Kipyegon took the race in an astonishing 2:29.15 and Muir was only slightly adrift in second in 2:30.82.

That smashed the Scottish and British records, with Holmes having previously clocked 2:32.55.

“It was so great to be back,’ said Laura, pipped by Jemma in Trieste a couple of weeks ago by two hundredths of a second over 800m.

“I’ve raced once already, but it was a very small meet, so to come here to race in such a great field and the crowd’s response has been really, really nice.

“Working together with Jemma has ensured we were working really hard out of lockdown and pushing one another really hard, so even though we didn’t have many competitions, we were still motivated to push each other on and run well.

“I think you’ve seen that in these last couple of races we’ve been running really well.

“Racing a time like today gives me a lot of confidence going into an Olympic year.

“To do that in my second run, to run a British record (held by Dame Kelly Holmes) I’m really pleased with it.”

After months without any competitive Diamond League meeting, the international athletics meet in Monaco was the first since the coronavirus pandemic forced a shutdown of sport.

The meeting usually features a capacity crowd of 16,000 but this was reduced to a maximum of 5000 this year to assist the meeting organisers to maintain health and safety protocols in the Stade Louis II.

World Athletics introduced a bespoke atmosphere creation system which was used to enhance the experience for the athletes, the spectators and the broadcast audience.

A sound operator used the system to generate custom spectator sounds in real time.

The Diamonds League continues this weekend when athletes arrive in Stockholm.

Laura is scheduled to line up in the women’s 1500m.

Additional reporting - scottishathletics.org.uk