Mo Farah’s ‘terrifying collapse’: tell me about it

Our columnist may not be as quick as Mo: but he can compete when it comes to midnight mysteries

Mo Farah after finishing the London Marathon
(Image credit: Tom Dulat/Getty Images)

These days it would probably take me as long to run 100 metres as it would take Mo Farah to complete a mile. But – apart from both living in the London Borough of Richmond – we do have one thing in common. In the past weeks we have both collapsed and done ourselves considerable physical mischief in mysterious circumstances in the middle of the night. And in both cases it was in the bathroom.

Mo has now revealed that it was because of this fall that he pulled out of the Glasgow Commonwealth Games. I have pulled out of nothing, but the parallels are strangely uncanny. Mo had severe stomach pains; I had – I think – seafood poisoning. In any event, I was severely sick just before collapsing. Mo chipped a tooth which had to be removed; I loosened several teeth – and bit my tongue severely.

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Robert Chesshyre writes regularly on police culture and is a former US correspondent of The Observer. His books include ‘The Force: Inside the Police’ and 'When the Iron Lady Ruled Britain''.