Jake Wightman opens up on receiving his Olympics call, the moment he felt he was 'done', arguing with his commentator dad - and why he felt like a 'fraud' at Wimbledon

Even when the phone call came, Jake Wightman did not know whether his Olympic dream was about to be rescued or wrecked.

The 30-year-old’s place in Paris had been in the balance ever since he missed last month’s British trials with a calf injury.

Wightman knew his chance of running the 1500 metres – the event he won gold in at the 2022 World Championships – was over after Neil Gourley and George Mills finished first and second in Manchester, and with current world champion Josh Kerr guaranteed the third selection spot.

But he held on to the hope he might get to go to the Games via a discretionary place in the 800m – and he was set to find out his fate from Steve Vernon, the endurance boss at UK Athletics.

‘When I saw the call, I knew it didn’t necessarily mean good news because he would ring me to deliver bad news as well,’ Wightman tells Mail Sport from his home in southwest London.

‘It was very stressful, so to hear him actually say I was going, it was just overwhelming relief. I can’t remember the last time I cried, I’m not that emotional a person. But I felt emotional on that call.’

Wightman was picked alongside world bronze medallist Ben Pattison and Max Burgin having clocked, at the time of selection, the fastest 800m by a British man this year. Now the Edinburgh-raised athlete wants to prove it was the right call by winning a global medal over two laps of the track.

‘It’s not a consolation prize,’ says Wightman, who claimed a European silver medal in the 800m two years ago. ‘I have been selected because they feel as though I am the most capable to go and perform there, so I have to go and do that.

‘Originally, there was a disappointment about not being in the 1500m. But I spoke to some friends and they were like, “How sick would it be if you won and your career had a world 1500m title and an Olympic 800m title - that would be better than winning the 1500m”.

‘That’s how I’m looking at it. It’s a chance for me to showcase I am not just a 1500m runner. I sometimes feel a bit under-respected with 800m. I was third in the world rankings in 2022.

‘I feel like I’ve got a bit of untapped potential over that distance, especially at championships. So I’m looking forward to trying to see what I can do.’

Wightman insists he has fully recovered from the calf he tore the week before trials – the latest in a long list of setbacks since his world title win.

His problems started when he fractured his foot jumping over hurdles in training in January 2023. Other injuries followed, causing him to miss the defence of his world 1500m title in Budapest.

While he was unable to run, Wightman had a summer of fun, attending the Royal Box at Wimbledon the Ashes Test at Lord’s. However, he was also plagued by guilt. ‘Sponsors pay for you to run well in their kit and when you are not doing that, you feel like a fraud,’ admits Wightman.

His lowest moment came last August, when he was working as a BBC pundit at the World Championships. ‘When I went to go and get my media accreditation and it was all ex-athletes, it made me feel like I was done,’ he says. ‘You are speaking about other people as if you are not in the sport. I didn’t like that. That was a real kick up the backside to be like, “I need to get back on the right side of the sport”.’

Wightman was out for 13 months in total but even when he did return, he still felt like the forgotten man. The realisation that he was yesterday’s news came at the Prefontaine Classic in Eugene in May, when he was up against Kerr – his former junior team-mate at Edinburgh Athletics Club who won the world 1500m title in absence – and Olympic champion Jakob Ingebrigtsen.

‘The sport moves on pretty quick,’ says Wightman, who has been followed for a Channel 4 documentary, which airs on Saturday. ‘There was so much build-up around that race and it was all about Jakob and Josh. I never once got a mention. I thought I deserved a little subheading or something!’

It had been on that same Eugene track two years earlier that Wightman was the headline act, beating both Ingebrigtsen and Kerr to world gold. That moment was made even more memorable by the fact his father Geoff was working as the stadium commentator, famously telling the crowd: ‘That’s my son, I coach him, and he’s the world champion.’

For Wightman, it was normal to hear his dad’s voice over the speakers as he regularly works as the stadium announcer at major athletics events. In Paris, though, Geoff has been overlooked for the job, meaning he will only be at the Stade de France as his son’s coach.

‘It’s funny because normally he is the one that is guaranteed to be going because of the announcing, whereas this time he was reliant on me getting there,’ says Wightman.

‘Whether or not he is on the mic doesn’t really make too much difference to my outcome, but the direct impact for me is that I have him there as coach.

‘That is a different situation for us, and he needs to get used to being in that environment. He likes chatting, but before a race you want to relax and calm down.

‘We clash a little bit where I am not afraid to say exactly what I think and he is not afraid to say exactly what he thinks. The older I have got, there have been more arguments. There have been times where my mum has had to step in!’

Wightman’s mum Susan was also an Olympic runner, finishing 12th in the marathon at Seoul 1988, while Geoff competed over the same distance at the 1990 Commonwealth Games. Athletics is so ingrained in their family that their summers were spent travelling to watch the sport.

‘We went to Beijing to watch the Olympics as a holiday,’ Wightman fondly recalls. ‘We got to watch Usain Bolt’s 100m world record.

‘But the pinnacle for me will always be 2012. Dad managed to get a ticket pretty much for every session. I was there for Super Saturday. That is special. It’s a night I won’t forget.’

Wightman’s own first experience of competing in the Olympics was more forgettable, when he finished 10th in the 1500m final at Tokyo 2020. But he now has the chance to make amends for that in Paris.

‘Tokyo was so low for me,’ adds Wightman, who is a National Lottery-funded athlete. ‘I had built it up for so long in my head that I’d come home with a medal and it would be a career-defining moment.

‘So to have such a disappointing run was gutting. It took me a fair few months to get out of that pity party. But the way I ran there is fuel for Paris.

‘The minimum I will finish my career with is a world title, but if you win Olympic gold, you are going to become much more of a household name. Hopefully Paris will be the Olympics I remember most fondly.’

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Path to Paris: The Hunt for Gold is on Channel 4 on Saturday at 4.55pm. It follows British athletes as they prepare for Paris 2024 and offers a unique insight into how National Lottery players support them on their journey.