Cambridge & Coleridge Athletic Club’s Tom Keen helps Great Britain and Northern Ireland to win first ever senior mixed relay medal at World Athletics Cross Country Championships

Tom Keen was part of a history-making Great Britain and Northern Ireland squad at last weekend’s World Athletics Cross Country Championships.

Alongside team-mates Alex Millard, Adam Fogg and Bethan Morley, the Cambridge & Coleridge Athletic Club member returned from Belgrade with a bronze medal in the senior mixed relay team race – the first time that Team GB has ever finished on the podium in that event.

Keen, who was making his debut in a senior British vest, started the quartet off strongly and handed over to Millard in ninth position.

Millard overtook her French counterpart during her lap to move Britain up a position before Fogg changed the complexion of the whole race as he reeled in the trio of Uganda, Japan and Morocco to slot into fourth slot.

That left Morley to bring the team home and she did so having eased past the USA’s Katie Izzo early on to seal a third-placed finish.

Twenty-two-year-old Keen, who is based in West Wickham, said: “It just went off so quickly, it really feels like a sprint all the way around.

“I think my leg was good enough to put the rest of the guys in a good position and allow their talents to bring it home for us.”

Keen’s success came 41 years on from his coach Mark Vile also winning cross country bronze on the world stage for Britain.

Despite a number of other impressive performances in separate races, Keen, Millard, Fogg and Morley were the only British athletes to win medals in Serbia.