Marc Scott seeking to add second Muller British Athletics Championship title to the records

Marc Scott is aiming to sign off a good season of performances with a second national title at the Muller British Athletics Championships this weekend.

The 26-year-old Cambridge & Coleridge AC member has not let the disrupted year impact displays on and off the track.

Scott stormed to a British record 13min 20sec in the Podium 5K in Barrowford at the start of August, missing the European record by just two seconds, and that followed becoming the European 5,000m indoor record in February.

“I’ve just been training injury free for a long time now,” said Scott.

“I had kept on making some progress and then I would get hurt, and then I would start back up again – things would go well, then I would get hurt again.

“I think I’ve just found a good balance in my training now, and analysed what is good for me and what I need to do, and not get caught up with anyone else and things seem to be paying off.

“I’ve been injury free for probably up to 18 months now, and I think that’s one of the main attributes to the success.

“I’ve run times I haven’t run before, so that’s always good.”

Scott is a member of the Bowerman Track Club in Portland, Oregon, which is a training group for professional distance runners sponsored by Nike.

As part of that, there is a quota of 10 races that he has to run each year – and, despite the lockdown, Scott has already surpassed that figure.

“I was doing intrasquad meets with my team out in the States,” he said. “We have 12 guys on the team and we were racing each other every 10 days – and they still counted towards PBs.

“I’m already at 10 races for the year, believe it or not, which is good, including indoors.

“Due to the coronavirus, I have raced a lot more than everyone else.”

It should stand him in good stead heading to Manchester this weekend, where he will be racing in the 5,000m and targeting a second national title – having previously taken the crown in 2018.

“Usually championship racing doesn’t bring very quick times unfortunately – it’s all about placing,” he said.

“I’m just looking to win the race, and become British champion for the second time in the 5k.

“The standard is pretty good. It’s harder to qualify for this race because the numbers are a bit more limited so they made the qualifying standard a little more difficult.

“It brings a good bunch of guys together.”

Scott’s partner is Holly Archer, also a member of C&C, who won the 1,500m at the SPAR British Indoor Championships back in February.

She will also be competing at the national championships in Manchester, again in the 1,500m.

“Things have been going pretty well for her, and we will just be looking to get a few more races,” said Scott.

“At the minute, we’re training together. I overlook her training a lot more recently, we go on runs together and do bits where we can but we’re obviously part of the same club at Cambridge. But we both jump in with other people as I do longer distances.”

Scott will racing in the 5,000m final on Saturday (September 5) at 2.30pm, while Archer will race in the heats of the 1,500m on Friday night.