Anyone who followed George Beamish’s college career at NAU could not have been overly worried when he went into the bell lap in Sunday’s men’s 1,500 meters at the Indoor World Championships in seventh place.
After all, this is Beamish, the man with the lethal kick.
He kicked to win the college indoors mile a few years back and, now, on the biggest stage, the New Zealander showed the world his fast finish. Still fifth entering the final turn, Beamish went outside and surged past Americans Cole Hocker and Hobbs Kessler to win with a personal best of 3:36.54. Hocker finished second and Kessler held on for third.
Afterward, Beamish held his head in his hands, as if surprised by ther victory. He shouldn’t have been. In a tactical race with 14 entrants, his kick was clearly the difference.
Kessler, who does speedwork in Flagstaff and originally signed a letter of intent to attend NAU before turning pro, led most of the way and held on to third. Kessler had recently been training in Flagstaff with 800 meter specialist Bryce Hoppel, who won the world 800 a few minutes earlier on the final day of events in Glasgow.
In the women’s 1,500, Flagstaff’s Nikki Hiltz ran a textbook Hiltz race. They held back in fifth place for most of the early going and still remained in that spot with less than three laps to go. Fellow American Emily Mackay then made a bold move to take the lead, and Ethiopia’s Freweyni Hailu and Hiltz gave chase.
Hailu, 23, was too strong and speedy, opening up a lead, but Hiltz, showing their kick, caught Mackay to win silver with a time of 4:02.32, a personal best.
Leave a Reply