Mo Farah has now won everything there is to win on the track for a long-distance runner but the newly-crowned 10,000m world champion insists he has his sights set on yet more gold later this week.
Farah stormed to the top of the podium in the Luzhniki Stadium, avenging his defeat against Ibrahim Jeilan over 25 laps in Daegu two years ago.
This time around it was the Ethiopian that had to settle for silver as Farah’s final kick in the home straight proved enough to cross the line first in a time of 27.21.71 minutes, with a 54 second last lap underlining his dominance.
The double Olympic champion is now the holder of both 10k and 5k world and Olympic titles. He is the first British athlete to win a 10,000m world title since Liz McColgan in 1991 and the first European man to take gold in the event at world level since 1983.
But Thursday’s 5,000m heats in Moscow are already on Farah’s mind and his motivation to keep chasing medals remains undiluted.
“I will take nothing for granted in the 5,000m now because I want to win as many medals as I can before the end of my career,” he said.
“It is that feeling that as it makes all the hard work worth it, to spend months away from my children, my new-born twins didn't even recognise me when I come home recently.
“That is very tough to take but when you cross that line it makes the hard work and sacrifices worth it.”
In Thursday’s heats over the shorter distance the Kenyans and Ethiopians will have to try and produce a quicker pace to run Farah out of the race.
Indeed the 30-year-old was delighted that he was not put under more pressure earlier in claiming Great Britain's first gold and first medal.
“I was surprised at how slow the pace was,” he added. “I knew the Ethiopians had four guys as did the Kenyans so there was a lot of talk they would take up the pace.
“My aim was to save energy and it was quite slow, it was the perfect race for me. I thought they would push the pace to try to get rid of me but it never happened."
Elsewhere, Eilish McColgan ran a personal best and set a new Scottish record of 9:35.82 minutes in qualifying for Tuesday’s 3000m steeplechase final.
“To run a personal best after the last eight weeks that I’ve had is absolutely unbelievable," she said.
"I’ve only managed to run twice a week and everything else is in the pool or on the cross trainer.”
Meanwhile, Christine Ohuruogu won her 400m heat with a time of 50.20 seconds to go through to the semi-finals as the fastest qualifier and Shara Proctor needed just one jump to qualify for Sunday’s long jump final but team-mate Lorraine Ugen is out on her World Championships debut after failing to record a distance.
“That’s all it took and that’s all it needed," said Proctor, after jumping 6.85m, just seven centimetres shy of her British record.
"That’s what I tried to do – just go out there and get one jump in, but it’s surprising I got 6.85m when I was so far behind the board.”
Dwain Chambers, Harry Aikines-Aryeetey and James Dasaolu all progressed their 100m heats, even though the latter, who turned heads when he ran 9.91 at the British Championships, scraped through as a fastest loser.
Dasaolu had not raced since setting that sparking new personal best last month and the 25-year-old admitted he got lucky.
“I haven’t had the best preparation because since I ran 9.91, I haven’t raced because of a hip problem,” said Dasaolu.
“That was my first time out of the blocks for a few weeks so I didn’t really know where I was heading into the race. Hopefully I can improve.”
Meanwhile, Chambers - competing at his seventh World Championships - admitted age is starting to catch up with him after coming through a tough heat that included one of the medal favourites Justin Gatlin.
“It was tough, but I got through. It felt like a hard race," he said.
"I guess that’s one of the things that I have to cope with at my age but I am happy with it. I wanted to give a better performance, but I did enough to get through and I have to make sure I find enough for tomorrow.”
© Sportsbeat 2013