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Britain’s Laura Muir won the 3000m event at the World Indoor Tour in Boston on Saturday — it was her season opener.

The European Championships and Commonwealth Games 1500m champion won in a time of eight minutes 40.34 seconds.

Melissa Courtney-Bryant finished second in the time of 8:41.09, while Katie Snowden took third in 8:47.41. A fourth Birtish runner in a row Hannah Nuttall at 8:47.72 gave North Americans a run for their money.

It was a new personal best for Snowden who previously ran 9:13.54 in 2018. Muir holds the British, Scottish and European records for the run with her 8:26.41 performance from Messehalle, Karlsruhe, Germany in 2017. The 29-year-old holds three other indoor records in the 1000m, 1500m and 5000m distances. Her 1000m 2:31.93 may be he her most impressive.

Muir also holds the 1000m and 1500m outdoor British records at 2:30.82 and 3:54.50. In August 2022, Muir ran a new 3000m outdoors personal best in the Lausanne Diamond League meet clocking a 8:30.53 finish. She is an 11-time Diamond League winner.

Lucia Stafford found her groove

Toronto’s Lucia Stafford ran to a personal best time at the New Balance Indoor Grand Prix in Boston on Saturday.

The 24-year-old clocked a 4:23.52 to finish second behind American Heather MacLean who ran 4:23.42.

Esther Guerrero of Spain took third in the time of 4:24.92 for a new personal best.

Stafford was in third position at 800m then moved into second place at 1200m. The 27-year-old MacLean held on for the win to also acheive a new personal best.

Stafford was coming off a Canadian and North American record run in the 1000m event on January 28 at Boston University clocking a 2:33.75 performance. It is her first national or area record of her career.

Just two months prior, Stafford ran the second-fastest Canadian road 5K on November 12 of 15:20 at the Road2Hope Marathon weekend in Hamilton, Ontario. Emilie Mondor holds the record from 2004 at 15:16 from Chula Vista, Cal. Stafford narrowly missed the final at the Tokyo Olympic Games in the 1500m distance event. She seems to be in the mode to continue to run at or near national records this summer.

Ben Flanagan…

Also on Saturday, Ben Flanagan of Kitchener, Ontario finished fifth in the men’s 3000m in the time of 7:43.49. American Woody Kincaid won clocking a 7:40.71.

The week prior, Flanagan set an indoors 5000m best of 13:11.12. The 28-year-old will need to run sub-13:07 to make the Canadian team competing at the World Athletics Championships. He will also need to be world ranked high enough — regardless of time — as well as be a top-three Canadian. He has his domestic competition, and is also known more for his 10,000m ability. Currently the fastest Canadian is St. Catherines, Ont., native Mo Ahmed, who holds the North American 5000m record at 12:47.20. Second all time in North America is Toronto’s Justyn Knight at 12:51.93.

Coming up of course is the continuation of the indoors season as well as a couple of noteworthy marathons including the Boston and London events that are World Marathon Majors. Boston will have the all time greatest marathon runner Eliud Kipchoge toeing the line. London has arguably the deepest men’s and women’s field in history. For Canadians two-time Olympian and former national record holder Malindi Elmore will be racing Boston, while current national record holder Natasha Wodak (2:23:12, Berlin 2022) — also a two-time Olympian will be running in London.

For Canadians, Julie-Anne Staehli will be competing indoors in Boston February 11 in the 5000m at the Boston University David Hemery Valentine meet. She will be improving on her own personal best of 16:33.45 from Boston 2016. It will be intrguiing how fast she will go as she owns an outdoors best of 14:57.50. The World Athletics standard for the 2023 Budapest, Hungary championships is 14:57.00. Expect her to make a run at that time this spring.

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