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It is not every day a reigning Commonwealth Games champion is asked whether he witnessed a murder in Glasgow. Then again, it has been quite a few days for the Australian 1500m runner Olli Hoare. After competing on Wednesday in the heats of the men’s mile – when he finished with bloodied knees after being tripped – the 29-year-old was asked about reports that he had come across a murder scene while out training with his teammate Ky Robinson.
“No, no, I didn’t see a murder,” Hoare said. “The murder that was reported was six miles away and also at a different time.”
Hoare and Robinson were heckled as they ran, though, with at least one of those shouting at the pair holding a knife and, as a result, the Australia team have been told not to wear their kit in the city.
It was thought initially the pair had witnessed the aftermath of the murder of Paul McMinigal, in the east end of the city, on Friday. “I don’t know how that came about because Ky and I were running in the afternoon,” Hoare said. “We’re running on the river. Somehow these Chinese whispers have come in.”
Hoare’s good friend Jake Wightman, the Scotland 1500m runner who is staying in the same hotel as the Australians, said: “I am sure I am allowed to say it, he saw someone with a knife. That was it. And now they were saying he was in a murder scene. They’re two stories put together. But we’re joking that he ran out on the track with a stab-proof vest.
“Glasgow is like any city. There’s good and bad parts and you see some things you don’t necessarily want to see. Unfortunately, he ran into the middle of that and I hope it didn’t affect him.
“We were having a laugh about it, just because of all the weeks you want Glasgow to look as best, on his first run that happens.”
Hoare was determined to move on. “We came across a police dispute,” he said. “There were people walking around saying things. But I was never threatened.
“There was nothing heinous about what was happening. We were just running through, and there were some characters, and that was it.”
Asked whether they were carrying knives or not, Hoare said: “They looked like they were carrying something, but they weren’t threatening us. There was police there. They were breaking up a dispute when Ky and I ran past and we didn’t even think to report it.
“When we came back, all of a sudden I had Jake Wightman and all the boys coming up saying ‘you’re in the papers’, and I was like: ‘For what? Did I offend somebody wearing an Aussie beer T-shirt?’”
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As for what had been shouted at him, Hoare said: “I don’t think it’s an appropriate thing to repeat so I won’t. But it doesn’t just happen here; it happens everywhere.
“The next day, I didn’t wear the team uniform because I didn’t want to bring attention to myself and I think particularly for the women running around, they’re in a much more different position than I am.
“At that point I thought: ‘Well, it’s better to save the kit because I don’t have a laundry machine.’ I can’t wash everything, and I want to make sure everything looks nice, so you don’t have sweat stains in the race. That was the main thing.”
At least Hoare’s day improved as he was reinstated by appeal into the final on Saturday. However, he has a major task on his hands against the one-mile world record-holder, Josh Kerr, the young Australian superstar Cam Myers, and Wightman, the world 1500m silver medallist, who all looked strong in their heats.
Kerr was in an especially confident mood after winning his heat in 3min 58.57sec. “It’s going to be a war out there,” he said. “It’s the home crowd, it’s our track, it’s our crowd. The rest of the guys want to take what’s ours. They will have to come with something on Saturday night because they are not going to get it easy.”
Kerr wore his custom-made Brooks Hyperion 222 spikes used to break the mile world record, which are super fast but contain no heel. “It definitely felt a little bit overkill – like driving a Formula One car along the street for a cup of coffee,” he said.
