Eilish McColgan has made something of a habit of succeeding against the odds.
Her first challenge, which arose the minute she began running, was to live up to the McColgan name.
McColgan’s mother, of course, is Liz McColgan, who is a former world and Commonwealth Games 10,000m champion, Olympic medallist and, during the course of her career in the 1980s and ‘90s, set a raft of Scottish and British records both on the track and the road.
Consequently, for Eilish McColgan, the pressure of being the daughter of one of Scotland’s greatest-ever athletes was, from day one, immense. Indeed, it would be too much for many to bear.
McColgan, however, has navigated the path of being the offspring of a sporting great with remarkable ease and has, it seems, not once been unduly affected by what could have been a crippling burden.
Then there was the career-threatening foot injury in 2011 at the age of only 20, with doctors warning McColgan she may never run again. Of course, she recovered, and did run again.
There was the Dundonian’s Commonwealth Games 10,000m title in 2022, which saw her become the first athlete, male or female, outwith the traditionally dominant African nations to become champion in the event for nearly three decades.
And there’s the way the 32-year-old has become a target for online trolls and body-shamers who claim, entirely erroneously and without evidence, that McColgan is too thin or too weak or too obviously suffering from an eating disorder to be a truly world-class athlete. In response, McColgan has become a de facto spokesperson for standing up for female athletes in the face of intolerable and blatantly sexist abuse about their appearance.
Today, McColgan will take on what is arguably the toughest test in athletics; the marathon.
Her debut over 26.2 miles, which will come at the London Marathon, is long-awaited.
McColgan first announced she would be moving up to the marathon several years ago, but her plan to make her debut in 2023 was thwarted by injury, before a 2024 marathon was also benched due to injury issues.
Finally, however, McColgan will now take on her first marathon.
That she will be a good marathon runner is a given.
She’s already achieved something approaching legendary status on the track, and on the road over shorter distances; in addition to her 10,000m Commonwealth title, McColgan is also a four-time Olympian, European medallist and her set numerous Scottish, British and European records over the past decade-and-a-half so given her pedigree, she will unquestionably be very, very fast over 26.2 miles.
But the real question is, can she become a true marathon great?
The potential is there for McColgan to become not only Scotland’s greatest-ever female marathon runner but perhaps even Britain’s. She certainly has the title of GB’s greatest-ever female marathon runner in her sights.
As things stand, Paula Radcliffe is, by some distance, Britain’s best-ever female marathon runner.
The Englishwoman has a quite remarkable record, with her most notable achievements her 2005 world marathon title, her three London Marathon titles, which she won in 2002, 2003 and 2005, and, perhaps her greatest achievement of all, her world record of 2 hours 15 minutes 25 seconds, which she set in 2003 and which stood for 16 years.
For context, Radcliffe’s time, which remains a British record is a considerable distance ahead of GB’s all-time number two, Calli Thackery, whose 2024 best is six minutes slower.
Despite the calibre of Radcliffe’s world record time and current British record it is, without question, within McColgan’s capabilities.
Not that being a world-class 10,000m or half-marathon runner automatically translates into becoming a world-class marathon runner but it certainly gives a decent indication of potential and given that McColgan’s half-marathon personal best of 65 minutes 43 seconds is almost identical to Radcliffe’s (the Englishwoman ran 65 minutes 40 seconds in 2003), the initial signs are that McColgan has the speed to match, or even better Radcliffe’s best-ever marathon time.
Where McColgan’s real challenge lies in comparison to Radcliffe is just how far the women’s marathon has moved on in the past twenty years.
The rate of progress over the distance has been truly remarkable and the world’s best female marathon runners are now running times which would have seemed unthinkable when Radcliffe was in her pomp.
The first sign of significant progress over the distance came in 2019, when Kenya’s Brigid Kosgei took just over a minute off Radcliffe’s record, before Ethiopia’s Tigst Assefa brought it down to 2:11:53 in 2023.
It was last year, however, that real shockwaves were sent thoughout the running world when Kenya’s Ruth Chepng’etich became the first woman ever to break the two hours ten minute barrier, clocking 2:09:56 in a remarkable run that, it has to be mentioned though, led to more than a few allegations and rumours of her time being achieved less than fairly. To put it simply, some claimed that such fast time could only have been achieved with the help of doping and although there has never been a shred of concrete evidence against Chepng’etich, there are many who remain sceptical of her achievement.
However, the fact the two hour ten minute barrier has been broken gives an indication of the level McColgan will have to reach if she’s going to mix with the world’s very best during her marathon career.
It’s likely too much to expect for McColgan to produce a truly world-class time today - given this will be her marathon debut, and the first time she’s ever run as far as 26.2 miles either in training or competition, there will be too many unknowns to expect her to be truly outstanding in London today.
But from there, marathon greatness is surely in McColgan’s sights.
The current Scottish record is held by Steph Twell and stands at 2:26:40 while number two on the list is McColgan’s mum, Liz, whose best is 2:26:52.
My expectation is McColgan will have bettered these two times within a year, if not sooner.
It’s from there, we’ll have to see quite how far she can go.
To become Britain’s best-ever, or certainly fastest-ever, female marathon runner would be quite an achievement for McColgan, perhaps the greatest-ever.
Staying injury-free is likely the single most important factor in achieving this.
And if she can, ultimately, establish herself as Britain’s best-ever, it couldn’t happen to a more impressive or deserving person.
