A Scottish Olympic gold medallist and two world indoor champions will help to officially open the MOWA Indoor Athletics Exhibition Glasgow 24 in the St Enoch Centre shopping mall on the evening of Friday 2 February.
The latest Museum of World Athletics (MOWA) heritage exhibition marks the staging of the World Athletics Indoor Championships Glasgow 24 (1-3 March 2024) and celebrates more than 170 years of indoor track & field athletics history.
Along with distinguished guests at the opening ceremony from the City of Glasgow, British Athletics, the Local Organising Committee, Scottish Athletics and Team Scotland will be 1980 Olympic 100m champion Allan Wells as well as 1993 world indoor champions Yvonne Murray-Mooney (3000m) and Tom McKean (800m).
Joining this distinguished trio will be a Scottish star of a more recent vintage, WIC Glasgow 24 ambassador Eilidh Doyle, herself a world and Olympic medallist and European champion.
The month-long MOWA exhibition features World Athletics Heritage’s collection of indoor athletics competition artefacts dating from the 1880s. The displays contain clothing, shoes, equipment, trophies and medals donated by more than 30 world champions and/or record-breakers.
The exhibits are supported by giant wall graphics, text, photographs and videos which take the visitor on a journey from the world’s first ‘indoor’ meeting in 1849 to the present day.
Appropriately, given the exhibition’s location, the displays have a distinctly Scottish feel. As well as competition items that the opening ceremony guests will be providing on the night, running spikes from Scottish world champions Liz McColgan (Tokyo 1991) and Jake Wightman (Oregon 2022) will be exhibited.
Life-sized photographs of Scotland’s two Olympic 400m champions Wyndham Halswelle (London 1908) and Eric Liddell (Paris 1924) will adorn the windows and walls of the exhibition. Greeting visitors at the entrance will be a large photograph of Laura Muir winning the first half of a 3000m and 1500m double at the European Indoor Championships in Glasgow in 2019.
As usual, stunning video material is incorporated into the displays including highlights of past editions of the World Athletics Indoor Championships and a cinematic edit of the Birmingham 2018 edition. For the first time in a MOWA exhibition, there will also be an experimental touch screen via which visitors can select videos from a small initial library of clips.
Usual MOWA favourites such as giant pole vault and high jump graphics set at their current world indoor record heights, and a colourful display of national athletics singlets, will also feature in the Glasgow exhibit.
During the final fortnight of the exhibition, there will be a free prize draw for visitors to enter. The prize will be unworn autographed clothing donated by Britain’s marathon world record-breaker Paula Radcliffe and combined events Olympic and world champion Jessica Ennis-Hill, who won the world indoor pentathlon title in 2010.
The MOWA Indoor Athletics Exhibition Glasgow 24, on the ground floor of the St Enoch Centre, 55 St Enoch Square, Glasgow G1 4BW, will be open daily to the public from 11am to 6pm from Saturday 3 February, closing on the final day of the World Athletics Indoor Championships Glasgow 24 (1-3 March 2024).
Source: World Athletics Heritage
Frederick Marfo is a sportswriter and social worker well known for his advocacy for equal chances and rights for all athletes, especially those with disabilities.
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