Teesside Tornado on retirement, the challenges of coaching, taking over from Carl Lewis and why he thinks Louie Hinchliffe is going to do "some serious damage" on the global sprints scene

The permanent move from athlete to coach has taken a little getting used to. “I was in the warm-up area with my wife, I got on to the track and I had my running gear on,” says Richard Kilty. “For about 15 seconds, I thought: ‘I’ve definitely got it today’. I completely lost myself, but you go into autopilot mode.” The habits of a life consumed by competitive sprinting, it seems, die hard.

It didn’t take Kilty too long to snap back to reality. A ruptured Achilles at last summer’s Olympics means he can barely muster a jog at the moment, never mind top speed, and proved to be the final straw for the 35-year-old.

For years he has been coaching in varying guises alongside his own top level career but, at the beginning of last month, the former world indoor 60m champion announced his retirement from what he calls a “beautiful but brutal sport”.

There hasn’t been a lot of time to stop and think about it all. Talking to some of the British media behind the scenes at the Omnisport Arena in Apeldoorn, he is clad in a bright yellow tracksuit top emblazoned with Lithuania across the back.

He is at the European Indoor Championships, an event in which he also won two 60m titles, as coach to his wife, the Lithuanian triple jumper Dovilė. Being back in that competitive environment not only brought out those aforementioned automated responses but stirred up some memories.

“When you get somewhere like this and you see the championship, I look back and think: ‘Wow, I won this thing twice, I was the man at one point here’. People are fighting to win it and to think that I won it twice is quite special.”

Now, Kilty’s world revolves around helping the athletes in his group towards experiencing their own special moments. In Apeldoorn, Dovilė produced her best international championships performance since winning the European under-23 title by coming fourth, while rather closer to home another of Kilty’s charges, 14-year-old Celine Obinna-Alo, broke the championships record in February by winning the England Athletics under-17 indoor title with a time of 7.38. It was just 0.03 outside of Asha Philip’s national under-17 mark and only 2000 Olympic bronze medallist Katharine Merry has run faster at the same age.

“She's 14 and she's been doing the sport for a year,” says Kilty. “You're going to hear a lot about her next year. At 15 and 16, she's going to be a force to be reckoned with.”

Most of the immediate attention, however, is going to fall on another member of the set-up that is based on Teesside in England’s North East. Louie Hinchliffe burst on to the sprinting scene last year when clocking 9.95 to become the first European winner of America’s prestigious NCAA 100m title, before adding the British title and then just missing out on the Olympic final.

The Yorkshireman’s impact was substantial but he raised more than a few eyebrows at the end of the summer when he announced his decision not only to forego the final year of his time at the University of Houston, where he was being coached by nine-time Olympic gold medallist Carl Lewis, and turn professional but that he was also going to be guided by Kilty.

The two, who formed part of the British squad which won 4x100m relay bronze in Paris, first got to know each other when they shared a hotel room at the London Diamond League last July. “We just had very similar philosophies,” Hinchliffe told the Guardian. “Very similar minds. I think that’s why we hit it off so well.”

His new coach is predicting big things. “Louie's doing really, really well,” says Kilty. “That kid’s just a phenomenal talent. He's got something very, very special and he's very unique. He can do some serious damage.

“He understands movement particularly well and he has got a unique way of movement, but he also has a unique build. All the best are unique in their own way and he's very, very special. I'm just there to maximise the talent he has.

“There have been a few times this year where he's trained, and you just think ‘wow’. Once he gets upright running, he's got the tools to be the very best.”

But what exactly is so special that could set the 22-year-old apart?

“It’s simple maths and the combination of two things,” says Kilty. “How fast can your legs go multiplied by how long is your stride length? He can turn his legs as fast as anyone in the world and, for his height [Hinchliffe is 5ft 9in], he can also generate a step length which usually only people who've got the limb length of a 6ft 2in person can. He's unique in the way he's able to do that and he's also got an incredible mindset. He's a champion in his head and I think it's just very exciting, the things that he can do.”

When asked if he expects Hinchliffe to become Britain’s number one sprinter and challenge for major medals, Kilty adds: “I believe he's capable of it.”

And can he break Zharnel Hughes’ British record of 9.83? “I wouldn't put the pressure on him to say we're going to do it this year, but if anyone can do it right now, it's Louie. I'm very excited to see him and Zharnel go head to head. I think if we get them both together healthy this year, it's going to be quite a tear-up.”

The first glimpse of how well Hinchliffe is settling into his new regime looks set to come at the beginning of May, when he is expected to open his racing year in Dubai. Kilty is well aware of the outside noises that were made about the partnership and his stepping into Lewis’ shoes, but the “Teesside Tornado” is bullish in his riposte.

“If I wasn't confident, I would never have taken Louie on,” he says. “I've got every faith I'm going to be one of the best coaches in the world. I've had six athletes compete this year and every single one of them has done a personal best, and they've all been trained by great coaches before.

“One thing's for sure, they'll be getting to the start line as well prepared as they can be and, when the gun goes bang, they'll be in the position to be as confident and ready to tear it up with the world's best.

“I wasn't the athlete Carl Lewis was, but I'm extremely smart, I'm extremely experienced and I'll back my athletes all the way. They'll enter that call room believing they're going to beat anybody with the words that I say to them. I've been trained by some phenomenal coaches and I'm thankful for them and all the knowledge I've gained. Every single one of them has taught me something, as has my own learning, and I just want to share that with all my athletes.

“I'm a young coach. I have been coaching on and off for a long time now and I've been helping coach my wife for the last eight or nine years, plus I coached the British relay teams in 2023, so it's not something that fazes me. You hear: ‘Richard's new, this is a rash decision’, but I believe the results will speak for themselves.”
That he is so busy on the coaching front has undoubtedly helped Kilty navigate the transition away from being a professional sportsman.

“It's all I ever had growing up,” he says of his previous life. “I always worried about it earlier in my career. I thought: ‘Yeah, I'm having success now but what will I do [when I retire]? But every morning I wake up and the first thing on my mind is: ‘How am I going to help my athletes get better today?’ and it's helped massively for me.

“I've got to say goodbye to myself that once was. Now I've got to prioritise other people and I think that's what a lot of coaches struggle with. There have been a lot of great athletes who've gone into coaching and the problem they've had is that they haven’t been able to let go of their ego. I believe, so far, that I've been able to do that – put my ego to one side, celebrate my own career and now be like: ‘It's about the athletes. It’s not about me’.

“So far it's been pretty smooth. There are a few moments where it can get a bit confusing but so far I'm really loving the challenge of being a coach.

“I believe I belong in the sport of athletics, and I want to stay in it for the rest of my life.”

Kilty ended his sprinting career with Olympic, world and Commonwealth 4x100m relay medals to his name, but it was indoors, over 60m, where he made the biggest noise. There was a world indoor title in 2014, followed by European indoor gold in 2015 and 2017.

“For sure I could have achieved more over the 100m but I was a very injury-prone athlete and, just genetically, the 60m was my superior event and I was brilliant at it,” he says.
It’s perhaps fitting, then, that the conversation wraps up not long before the identity of the men’s 2025 European Indoor 60m champion is decided.

“Jeremiah,” says Kilty emphatically when asked who he is tipping to win. “I believe he's capable of running under 6.50. We haven't seen that in Britain, I guess, since myself but he can do it. He has the tools to do it.”

Later that evening, Jeremiah Azu will run a PB of 6.49 to convincingly win gold. Perhaps coach Kilty really does know what he’s talking about.