‘It’s going to be grim’: Aussies take on World Athletics Cross Country Championships on home soil

They call it the toughest race in the world.

Race director for Saturday’s World Athletics Cross Country Championships in Bathurst, Richard Welsh, was given an instruction when the course was designed.

“Make it difficult”, World Athletics told Welsh — and he has delivered.

“The Australian athletes have had a look at the course and said it was the toughest course they’ve ever seen,” Welsh said.

Australian mixed relay competitor Abbey Caldwell was one of those athletes who walked the two-kilometre circuit in the middle of Bathurst’s famous Mount Panorama motor racing track several weeks ago.

Her assessment? 

“Grim. There is no easy part of the course,” Caldwell told ABC Sport.

“You’re either going up or you’re going down, there’s not a moment to reset and regain your momentum.

“It’ll be hard and fast, and it will separate a lot of the field and that’s why I use the word ‘grim’, because it won’t be down to tactical running for anyone.

Welsh has mapped out a circuit that rises and falls 58 metres – including one climb with an 11 per cent pinch — and includes a mud patch and a 50-metre sand pit.

Much of the course is off camber and there are numerous tight turns.

“We know that we’re going to get punched in the head in the first 30 seconds because the course is that tough,” said well-known Australian distance coach Nic Bideau.

Bideau coaches Australia’s top hope in the senior men’s race, Jack Rayner, as well as Olympic 1500 metres finalist Stewart McSweyn, who will be competing in the mixed 4x2km relay.

McSweyn said the presence of the mud and sand added to the challenge of the course.

“It’s going to kind of be a grind circuit, where you never feel like you’re never feeling that good any of the way,” McSweyn said.

“You’re just going to have to be tough, and tough out the whole of the race.

“But I grew up on a farm, so I’m used to running on uneven farmland in uneven conditions.”

McSweyn highlighted the Australian contingent’s other secret power: home-ground advantage.

“We’ve got the home crowd and I think that will give us a bit of an advantage and hopefully help us get around the course,” he said.

“We’ve actually seen it, so we know what to expect.”

Aussies well represented

Twenty-eight Australian athletes will compete at the World Championships over five races on Saturday afternoon.

There will be six in each of the individual races — the men’s and women’s senior events (both 10km) and the under 20s events (8km for men and 6km for women) — and four will take part in the mixed relay.

All up, there will be 453 athletes from 48 countries competing, including some of the best distance runners in the world.

Among them are the men’s and women’s world record holders in both the 5,000m and 10,000m events on the track: Uganda’s Joshua Cheptegei and Ethiopian Letesenbet Gidey.

Cheptegei is the defending champion in the men’s senior race at the World Athletics Cross Country Championships.

He is the reigning Olympic 5,000m gold medallist and in Bathurst will have stiff competition in the form of Kenyan Geoffrey Kamworor, who won the senior race in 2015 and 2017.

Cheptegei’s countryman Jacob Kiplimo — who won gold in the 5,000m and 10,000m at last year’s Birmingham Commonwealth Games — is another contender.

Kiplimo is also the men’s world record holder in the half marathon.

Gidey — bronze medallist at the 2019 world cross country titles in Denmark — is expected to be challenged by Kenyan Beatrice Chebet.

Chebet won the junior race four years ago and is also the Commonwealth Games gold medallist in the 5,000m.

The presence of these world-class athletes in Australia is providing motivation for the local distance brigade.

“It’s a massive coup,” McSweyn said.

Caldwell said she was looking forward to competing against some of the world’s best in Bathurst.

“I’m well and truly inspired by many, many athletes and I think when you’re in the presence of those kind of people, it’s hard to not admire what they’ve done, the work they put in and just the athletes they are,” Caldwell said.

International athletes set to be ‘shocked’

Bideau said the visiting contingent would get a surprise when they arrived in Bathurst.