The newly crowned Paralympic T20 and world 1500m champion on his training regime, Paris 2024 and his incredible season so far
Fife AC’s Ben Sandilands – crowned world 1500m champion in Paris in 2023 (in the T20 category for athletes with an intellectual impairment) – opens up about the training programme that helped him win Paralympic gold in the French capital.
Sandilands set a new world record of 3:45.40 at the Stade de France – breaking American Mikey Brannigan’s 3:45.50 – to make the top of the podium.
The 21-year-old had a lifetime best of 3:47.02 and before Paris 2024 won the ambulant 1500m at the London Athletics Meet in July. His mile best of 4:06.02 was the fifth-fastest in Scotland in 2023, while his 3000m PB (8:11.80) ranks him in the Scottish top 20 for the year to date.
Sandilands is coached by Steve Doig and trains in a mixed ability group alongside fellow Great Britain internationals Owen Miller, the reigning Paralympic T20 1500m champion, and Steven Bryce, his T20 1500m team-mate at the World Para Athletics Championships in Paris.
“Owen is definitely an inspiration and has been really positive [about the Paralympic Games], as has Steven,” says Sandilands, who first joined Doig’s group at Fife AC at the age of nine.
“Owen has always been there,” adds Sandilands’ mum, Claire. “I think he’s very like Ben and he’s just told him to enjoy the experience and to treat the race like any other!”
Ben Sandilands (Getty)
Athletes in the T20 category can find it hard to absorb information, particularly in competition environments, and for Sandilands that can mean difficulty in remembering race instructions, pacing, or potentially even how far he’s running.
Track laps are, in theory, easier to compute, but Sandilands’ talent is not limited to the 1500m. In March he ran the second-fastest short leg overall as Fife AC finished fifth at the Scottish National Road Relays, and in May he was third at the Scottish 5km Road Championships in 14:25 (his 5km PB is 14:17 from April 2024 and ranks him 12th fastest in Scotland this year).
Previously, he has represented Scotland in cross country; in fact, when he made his debut at the Antrim International Cross Country in January 2018, he made family history.
Over 100 years ago, his great, great grandfather George Sandilands had also earned his first Scotland vest, finishing fourth in the 100 yards at the Scotland versus Ireland international athletics event at Ibrox Park, Glasgow in 1910.
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