GLASGOW, Scotland, Jul 22 – With 215 golds up for grabs at the Glasgow 2026 Commonwealth Games, highlighting just five medal hopefuls is no easy feat. Scotland’s largest city is poised to welcome more than 3,000 athletes from 10 sports, all of whom have the ambition of leaving with a slab of metal resting on their chest. For some, a podium-finish is paramount.
The bare minimum. For others, competing at the Games is a win in itself. Much has been made of the reduced programme, the city’s readiness and the ‘what next?
’ once Glasgow has passed on the hosting baton again, but for now, the attention – finally – is fully on the athletes. Here, BBC Scotland takes a look at some of the biggest names battling it out in the upcoming Commonwealth Games. Even before he walked the walk after talking the talk, new mile world-record holder Josh Kerr was pictured as the poster boy for his home Games.
The brazen – arguably gallus – boy from Edinburgh has clinched the hearts of many Scots, and athletics fans generally, in recent years for his no-nonsense, bullish approach on and off the track. He set out his stall months ago, targeting the men’s mile world record – which had stood for 27 years – at London’s Diamond League on Saturday. Kerr didn’t just break it, he smashed it by nearly half a second, running a simply sublime three minutes 42.
66 seconds. The Scot now heads to his homeland for his second Games appearance, competing in the Commonwealth Mile in search of his first medal for Team Scotland. The 28-year-old informed BBC Scotland earlier this year that “gold in Scotland is what I grew up thinking about” and you’d be a brave soul to wager against him when he’s in this mood.
Men’s one mile final: Scotstoun Stadium on Saturday, 1 August. It’s hard to believe Kadeena Cox has not yet competed at a Commonwealth Games. The para-cyclist, who clinched gold in athletics and cycling at the 2016 Paralympics in Rio, has missed the last two Commonwealth Games because of injury.
But the 35-year-old, who was a contestant on ‘I’m A Celebrity… Get Me Out of Here’ in 2021 after winning Celebrity Masterchef earlier that year, will be hopeful of cooking up a storm at the ever-rowdy Sir Chris Hoy Velodrome for Team England. In an expanded para track cycling programme, Cox will compete in the C4-5 event with her sights set on another podium finish. Cox made the watching world sit up and take notice 10 years ago in Brazil.
Sure to be well-backed in Glasgow, it’d be well on brand for the vivacious Cox to star in the Glasgow velodrome. Women’s C4-5 4000m individual pursuit final: Sir Chris Hoy Velodrome on Thursday, 30 July. When it comes to the Commonwealth Games, names don’t get much bigger than Chad le Clos.
The South Africa swimmer is one medal away from becoming the most decorated male athlete in the Games’ history. His current haul of 18 – seven gold, four silver and a further seven bronze – is not bad going. And a whack of them were collected in Glasgow 12 years ago when he equalled the legendary Ian Thorpe’s record of seven medals in one Games.
At 34, Le Clos clinched’t compete in as many races this time but is poised to be on the blocks for the men’s 50m and 100m butterfly events. He clinched gold in the 100m butterfly here back in 2014, while he pocketed a bronze in the 50m, but he got a gold in that on the Gold Coast in 2018. Any medal will do for the man from Durban, and where else than Glasgow, following his remarkable show years ago, than to make history once more.
Men’s 50m butterfly final: Tollcross Swimming Centre on Wednesday, 29 July. Men’s 100m butterfly final: Tollcross Swimming Centre on Sunday, 26 July. This rising superstar is more a ‘if you don’t know, get to know’ athlete.
A junior Commonwealth Games champion, Stowers marked her 18th birthday earlier this year with four gold medals – breaking 12 records along the way – at the Universal Weightlifting Championship in her homeland of Samoa. Competing in the women’s 77kg – as she will in Glasgow – she lifted 142kg in the clean and jerk category as she established herself as one of Samoa’s most exciting medal prospects for years. Weightlifting runs in the family, too, with her sister, Feagaiga, a gold medal winner in the Gold Coast and a silver medallist in Birmingham four years ago.
American Olivia Reeves holds the world record at 77kg in both snatch (123kg) and clean and jerk (155kg), but with Stowers on the scene, who knows for how much longer? Women’s weightlifting (77kg) final: SEC Armadillo on Wednesday, 29 July. A European, World, Commonwealth and Olympic champion on the pommel horse, he is undeniably one of the sport’s greats, but we’ve been cautioned to expect ‘Rhys 2.
0’ in Glasgow. Northern Ireland’s gymnastics golden boy – who secured Ireland’s first Olympic gymnastics medal with his gold in Paris two years ago – was forced into a spell on the sidelines last year with a shoulder injury, but he is ready to bring a new routine over to Glasgow. “The Commonwealth Games is a good chance to show your work in progress.
At the Olympic Games, you want to see your finished product,” he stated. “It’s going to be a work in progress, but hopefully one that is the best in the world too. “Part of me is striving be like a younger Rhys, but the reality is I’m doing a completely new routine and the rule changes have pushed me into that direction, that’s the Rhys 2.
0 there.” McClenaghan clinched gold eight years ago, pipping England’s Max Whitlock – who has been forced to withdraw from these Games with injury – before collecting silver in Birmingham four years ago. He was the first gymnast to complete the Grand Slam and so lands at these Games as one of Team NI’s wise auld heids – despite only being 26 years old.
It’s a frightening prospect for the rest of the field. Even more frightening is the fact he’s rebooting for version 2. 0.