Farah tells rival to f*** off

This was not the Olympics but Mo Farah's reaction as he accelerated clear with the finish line in sight showed how much the victory meant. Photo by: Pierre Albouy/Reuters

This was not the Olympics but Mo Farah's reaction as he accelerated clear with the finish line in sight showed how much the victory meant. Photo by: Pierre Albouy/Reuters

Published Jul 10, 2015

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This was not the Olympics but Mo Farah’s reaction as he accelerated clear with the finish line in sight showed how much the victory meant.

He gritted his teeth and punched the air before performing his trademark Mobot to the delight of an enraptured crowd who had watched him outsmart and outsprint one of the best 5,000m fields ever assembled.

It is a shame for him the crisis management team he has employed were not on hand to intervene at that point, because what Farah did next threatens to overshadow his exploits on the track.

As British team-mate Andy Vernon approached to offer a handshake, Farah turned his back on him. Vernon, who finished 15th, claims Britain’s double Olympic champion then told him to ‘f*** off’.

The outburst marred Farah’s first race in six weeks. He had not been on the track since competing over 10 000m in Eugene, Oregon, on May 29, before the doping storm surrounding his coach Alberto Salazar began. Farah has remained loyal to his coach but says the whole affair is ‘killing’ him.

The bad blood between Farah and Vernon dates back to an ill-tempered exchange on Twitter earlier this year. Farah branded Vernon an ‘embarrassment’ and mocked him by saying, ‘Come back when you win something decent’. Vernon had criticised the lack of competition Farah faces when he runs in Britain.

Vernon said he came to Lausanne to ‘bury the hatchet’ before he joins Farah at Font Romeu in the French Pyrenees.

‘I went to shake his hand and he turned his back on me and told me to f*** off. It’s disgraceful. I’m glad you saw it,’ Vernon told Sportsmail.

‘I’m going up to Font Romeu in a few days and I just wanted to end it. It’s in the past. I don’t know why we can’t just forget about it. With all the bad publicity he’s getting, I would have thought he’d try to make a good name for himself again but by doing that it’s not good for him.

‘I wanted to congratulate the performance, despite whether we’re friends or not.’

When Farah was asked if there had been an issue with Vernon after the race, he replied: ‘I don’t know, not that I saw.’

Farah hit the front with three laps left, with Ethiopian Yomif Kejelcha, 17, on his shoulder. Kenyan Caleb Ndiku, the biggest threat to Farah’s world title hopes, was also in the mix. Kejelcha went to the front with 300m to go but Farah outsprinted him down the straight to finish in 13min 11.77sec.

Zharnel Hughes, the Anguilla-born teenager who switched allegiance to Great Britain last month, announced himself as a World Championships medal contender by winning the 200m.

The 100m final rivalled the dirtiest races in history, with five of the seven men having served drugs bans. Twice-banned Justin Gatlin won in 9.75sec ahead of Asafa Powell and Tyson Gay. – Daily Mail

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