*12 August*: Ohuruogu reels in opponents on final straight of 400m final before surging past Amantle Montsho on the line
* *Coming around the final bend, Christine Ohuruogu was lying fourth in the women's 400m world championship final. Down the final straight, she seemed to glide past the United States's Francena McCorory and Natasha Hastings simultaneously with 50m remaining, but the defending champion, Amantle Montsho, the pre-race favourite in Moscow, was still more than a couple of metres ahead of her. Even for an athlete who had won her world and Olympic titles with her strength in those final stages, the gap appeared insurmountable.
Montsho, though, was one of the athletes Ohuruogu had overtaken on her way to silver behind Sanya Richards-Ross at the London Games. One year on and Montsho was tying up; Ohuruogu inexorably surged on in the final 10m. At the line, the British captain dipped, Montsho did not.
Ohuruogu had timed her run better than she had in London, unlike her coach, Lloyd Cowan. "I never watch my athletes race at major championships, I haven't done in years. When Christine was getting into her blocks to race in the 400m final of the World Championships in Moscow I was looking for a toilet to wait it out in. Only trouble was that in Moscow I timed it all wrong and came out of the bogs too early. I caught the last 13 seconds of the race on an officials' monitor, just in time for 'that moment'. Christine dipping for the line, and everyone's heart in their mouth, not knowing the result.
"That race was Christine all over. It's not the way we practised it, but it's the way she likes to run. She's a chaser. That's what I've always called her. She needs bodies in front of her and then she just moves through the gears quickly and she's away. But it's not easy watching for the rest of us.
"Over that last 100m I was on the edge of my seat. When Christine got to 50m to go I was thinking, 'Maybe it's a stretch too far …' but that last 10m was something awesome. She's just so strong. When I saw Christine and Montsho both go for the line I honestly thought, 'Christine's got it wrong again, she's mistimed the race.' Then she dipped, and like most people I just went, 'Ohh!'"
Still the result was in doubt. The pair had crossed the line together in 49.41secs and an anxious wait remained. As the replays ran, the times were refined. Ohuruogu took gold by four-thousandths of a second, 49.404 to the Botswanan athlete's 49.408.
"No one knew who had won, and it was even more confusing because I was watching on this tiny official's screen where the writing was all in Russian," says Cowan.
"When the winning name finally came up I couldn't read what it said – although it looked like too many characters to be 'Montsho'. Then Christine started clapping. She turned round and looked at the TV cameras, smiling, and it was all over."
In victory, Ohuruogu became the first female British athlete to win two world championship titles and, significantly, her time broke Kathy Cook's 29-year-old British record.
"I just felt relief then, more than anything else," Cowan says. "Coaching is hard work, and it's a long road. To try and get an athlete into shape for as many years as we have done is very difficult. We've had people trying to knock us, saying: 'Christine's lost it'. There was the quad injury in 2010, which took her a year longer to come back from than the doctors predicted, and the disqualification at the last World Championships in Daegu, 2011. I said to Christine at the time: 'You know what? True champions never stop.'"
"So we changed our tactics ahead of London 2012 – racing more on the circuit, trying to get faster – and picked up the Olympic silver medal. By 2013 we had pretty much won everything, we just wanted to break Kathy Cook's record, and I knew Christine was in the right shape to do it. At the training camp in Barcelona, a week before the Championships, she was getting everything right. Her pace was perfect, her weight, her hydration levels, everything was on point. She looked comfortable, and I felt she could run 49.1sec.
"If Christine had run that 400m final according to the plan I made for her then she would have done. But then that's not Christine. I say it to her every time: how she performs over the first 300m is key. We know she is very strong in the last 100m, but to run faster overall she has to be more aggressive in that first 200m. Instead she sits on the fence. She should have run 23.6secs in that first 200m, instead she ran 25.8 which left her three 10ths of a second behind the other girls.
"When she ran that final bend in Moscow, I thought: 'OK, we're in contention', because I know how the last 100m is likely to pan out in every race. I know that Amantle Montsho's personal best is around 13.7sec, and I know that Christine can run 13.2.
"That left Christine with about five-10ths of a second on Montsho to play with. That's not a lot, so I knew it would be close. In the end it was a little too close. I've got to be honest I'm not happy with the way she ran that race, but of course I'm happy with the outcome. I still want her to run faster, because I know she can. We want to try and get Christine's record to a place where it won't be broken for another 30 years. That's the next challenge."
Reported by guardian.co.uk 54 minutes ago.