Max Burgin interview: Seb Coe's record under threat from a Halifax Harrier who is finally championship-ready
The oldest record still standing in British men’s track athletics was set by a former runner from Hallamshire Harriers who has bestrode the Olympic Movement like a titan for nearly half a century. That it is finally being threatened by a Halifax Harrier who was trained by his dad and also built his internal engine on the hills of Yorkshire, offers a poetic symmetry.
Seb Coe, whose father Peter made him run up the hills of Walkley, Crookes and Ringinglow around his Sheffield home, stopped the clock at 1.41:73 when running the 800m in Florence, Italy, on June 10, 1981. By then he was already Olympic champion in the 1,500m, a title he would defend three years later.
Max Burgin, who for many years was sent running up Shibden Wall and Trooper Lane near his Halifax home by his dad Ian, is the man putting pressure on Coe’s 44-year-old mark.
The 23-year-old lowered his own two-lap time to 1.42:36 at the Diamond League meeting in London in July, the zenith of what so far has been the most consistent of seasons for an athlete who is finally benefitting from good health.
His 2025 campaign culminates in Tokyo this week for the athletics World Championships, when Coe, as president of that body, will be in attendance.
A medal in the 800m final would mean the world to Burgin, but supplanting Coe would add that extra bit of gloss.
“After this season it feels very much in touching distance,” said Burgin this week from his training camp in Japan.
“Whether it’s something I can run at these championships, I don’t know, championship running is not always the best place to go chasing times.
“It’s something that feels very much achievable for me now. Hopefully we see it broken, if not in the next few weeks, then the next year.”
That Burgin is talking with a smile on his face and a spring in his step owes much to the fact that he is in the form of his life.
For years he has been spoken of as the next big thing in British middle-distance running, only for injury to repeatedly cut him down. The last time a major event was in Tokyo – the delayed 2021 Olympics – he had to watch from his sofa as hamstring and groin injuries wiped out his season.
Then once he got back to full fitness, the summer of 2022 that promised world championships, Commonwealth Games and European Championship opportunities was brought crashing down when he contracted deep vein thrombosis on the flight out to the first of those in Oregon.
“The winter after Eugene was the lowest point,” admits Burgin. “It was the closest I came to thinking I can’t do this.
“But I kept ticking along. Pushing through that winter and still making the world championships in 2023 was enough to prove to myself that I should keep going.”
Still there were niggles – Achilles, hamstring, nerve damage – that meant his achievement in becoming the first British man to reach an Olympic final for 12 years in Paris last summer, without a full winter of healthy work, reinforced the belief that he was on the right track.
“Because one of these days you’re going to have a season when you don’t get these injuries,” he says, recalling what he repeatedly had to tell himself. “So if you can push through these tougher seasons, you’ve just got to hang in there. I’m grateful to have finally made it to this point.”
He is a genuine medal contender out in Tokyo. In six Diamond League meetings this summer, he has finished outside the top four only once. He finished second in Zurich ahead of reigning world champion Marco Arop and behind only Olympic champion, Emmanuel Wanyonyi.
“That gave me a lot of confidence that I can be close to not just the Olympic champion, but also the previous world champion,” reflects Burgin.
“I’ve known for years now that if I was to have a full season, string more training sessions and more races together than I have done, that I’d be able to produce a much higher standard of performance.
“So what I’ve done this year has not surprised me, it’s very much something I hoped to do.
“It’s a product of being able to be in these Diamond League races and learn how to do them and how to approach them.
“They’ve been a high standard and I’ve really benefitted from them. Nearly all the races I’ve done has been the standard of a world championship final or a semi-final.
“That really has brought some good times and good performances out and gives me a lot of confidence going into these championships. It’s been my best season consistency wise, and my first since 2018 that I’ve managed to have a full season and hit every race I wanted to.
“I’m arriving in Tokyo in a completely different state than I was compared to Budapest or Paris last year.
“I’m one of the favourites going into it again, like I was in Eugene. So it feels like I’ve come through a rough patch and clawed my way back to where I was. It feels good to be back in the conversation.”
For an athlete so bedevilled by injury, it’s a wonder he hasn’t wrapped himself in cotton wool in the lead up to Tokyo – or at least booked himself a seat in first class.
With UK Sport funding not extending that far, Burgin has learned from past experiences. He wears flight socks and takes blood thinners before flying long-haul, while keeping the nerve issues at bay is something he has learned to manage.
He is also still learning how to run at the highest level. Traditionally a front-runner when beating British fields – as he did at the UK Championships in August – he knows his tactics must be versatile on the biggest stage. “How Wanyonyi approaches these championships means the races go quite similarly, but he could change tact and if he did it would change it quite dramatically because there’s not too many frontrunners in the mix at the moment,” says Burgin ahead of the heats on Tuesday, semi-final on Thursday and final on Saturday.
“I’ve tried that approach before at championships, whether it would be right in this one I’ve no idea.
“It’s just nice to be able to look at the other people and be thinking there’s no one here I can’t beat.”
If he manages it there will be no one prouder than dad Ian and grandfather Brian, two more Burgins steeped in Halifax Harriers history.
“They were huge influences on me, real sources of motivation,” he says of both men who have coached him.
“Over the last few years it’s been a massive benefit having my dad in that coaching role as the one who’s going to have the patience to get through all the setbacks. Someone who is a constant in your life and keeps you accountable.”
And if he breaks that British record in the process, don’t be surprised to see Lord Coe get to his feet and applaud.