IN THE RUNNING FOR GREATNESS

Just like Mo and Jess, Josh wants back-to-back gold medals

- BY CHARLIE BENNETT in Tokyo

THE champion is 1500 metres away from becoming a legend.

Josh Kerr is bidding to emulate Mo Farah and Jess Ennis-Hill today and join the pantheon of British sporting greats by bagging back-to-back World Championship golds.

If he does so, the Scotsman will join double Olympic champ Seb Coe as a king of British middle-distance running.

Coe, now World Athletics president, will be watching on like the rest of us. This is a legacy-defining race for Kerr, and the 27-year-old is well aware of it.

It might not be the Olympic final, and he might not have to go through his great rival, Jakob Ingebrigtsen, or Olympic champion, Cole Hocker, but this is still a wide-open field on a global stage.

And after clinching his place in today’s race, Kerr said he is ready for a no-holds-barred fight, and his rivals will have to prise the gold medal out of his grasp.