British sprinter remembers his 60m triumph at the World Indoor Champs in Sopot, Poland, on March 8, 2014, in 6.49.
The Teesside Tornado nearly quit the sport to join the Army after Olympic rejection in 2012 and was only added to the 2014 world indoor squad when trials winner James Dasaolu pulled out due to injury. However, he seized his opportunity in Poland.
I’d never run a full indoor season before 2014. I was more focused on the 200m. I felt like I was wrongly not selected for the London 2012 Olympics. I had the 200m standard but [selectors] Charles van Commenee and Tony Lester decided not to take me and just leave a spot open, which was bizarre at our home Games. Then, in 2013, I had the qualification standard, was ranked number one in the UK, and I finished second at the trials, but they still didn’t select me for the 200m at the world championships in Moscow.
In preparation for 2014, during that winter season I teamed up with long jumper Chris Tomlinson in Teesside and he said to me: “You should do a season at the 60m because, in your 100m races, you’re flying.” A few years before that, Linford Christie had also told me I could do well in the 60m but I just did the odd race here and there.
I had a great training camp in South Africa, and I was running really fast. Then my first race was a 6.68 and my second was 6.63. I was like: “Maybe I’ll just forget this indoor season.”
But then I went to the British Championships, ran 6.53 and eventually got selected for the World Indoor Championships. I still went in as a 66-1 underdog since I’d lost most of my races that year. Dwain Chambers, who was the European record-holder, had beaten me a few times. Nesta Carter had beaten me. Kim Collins had beaten me.
Some of the greatest 60m runners of all time were in the field in Sopot. Su Bingtian, the fastest man ever to travel through 60m when he clocked 6.29 in the Olympics, Marvin Bracy, a world 100m silver medallist – it was an insane line-up.
But I was getting quicker with every race. I was finishing ridiculously strong between 30m and 60m and running people down. Carter beat me in the semi-final after I beat him in the heat but I knew I had more. What helped me massively was the biomechanist Paul Brice, who I think is the best in the world and one of the huge reasons behind the British relay success that we had from 2016.
I felt that, between 30m and 40m, I was getting stuck in my drive phase and not coming out of my transition quickly enough. He pulled out the numbers from the heats for zero to 30m and 30m to 60m. Between 30m and 60m was Richard Kilty: 2.62 seconds. Marvin Bracy: 2.65. Dwain Chambers: 2.65 … and then everyone else. However, from zero to 30m Marvin was 3.87, Su 3.87, Dwain 3.8 but Richard Kilty 3.90.
He said: “Richard, if you get to 30m quicker, you’re going to run away with it in the last 30m.” It completely changed my perspective on what I was going to focus on in the race. Because of this amazing data, he told me and my coach: “If you could get out the blocks a little bit quicker, you’re going to be world champion.”
Some of the greatest starters of all time were in that race but, if I was with them at 30m, I was going to win. I remember just being so confident that I was going to deliver my fastest time ever. I’d run 6.52 in the semi, but I knew that I was capable of running under 6.50.
The gun went and, as soon as I put my first foot down, Nesta disappeared. He just didn’t react. I was laser-focused driving to 30m. I could see Su’s red vest to my left and Bracy’s to the right, with Dwain’s white vest directly to the left of me. As I got up into my running at about 40m, I just felt them slowly go behind.
As I leant towards the line, I dipped and looked towards my left and I knew I’d beaten Dwain and Su because I couldn’t see them. When I hit the boards at the end, I looked up and I could see British flags waving everywhere. And the commentator in Poland was shouting, “Richard Kilty!”.
I went to celebrate, and then I thought: “No, maybe someone dipped me to the right. Do I celebrate? Do I not?”. Then it flashed up on the big screen: “Richard Kilty, world champion”. Tina Turner’s Simply The Best started booming out, and I dropped to my knees and closed my eyes. When I opened them, the cameras were around me. It’s surreal how it all happened in less than six-and-a-half seconds.
There were so many times where I almost walked away from the sport. I nearly made a few decisions where my life would have gone sideways and then, when I won that, it was just phenomenal – the feeling that I got from the fact that everybody had counted me out, that the odds were completely stacked against me in every way possible. I was 66-1 and I haven’t heard of anyone yet who won a lot of money on me that night. I felt like it was me against the world at that stage.
It was also a huge win for people who come from my type of background. I grew up on one of the roughest council estates in the north east of England. The majority of my family members had been in and out of jail. There wasn’t really much success within touching distance to me, so I had to rely on my own character.
I was a street kid and athletics was my way out, the way of changing my life. I always knew that I had a talent. I always knew that I had a very tough, resilient character, and that night showcased it all. It’s a night that I’ll never, ever forget.
The Richard Kilty Athletics Academy runs the Sprint to Success programme with funding from Allwyn and UK Sport’s ChangeMakers Fund
