Josh Kerr won mile gold at the Commonwealth Games in Glasgow, running 3:54.12s in a tactical race, two weeks after he set the world record in the distance.The 28-year-old finished ahead of rising star Cam Myers — the fastest teenage miler ever — who took silver for Australia. Former 1,500m world champion Timothy Cheruiyot finished third, adding a bronze to two silvers at previous Commonwealth Games.“It means everything, this was the championships of my season, this was the one that we had circled on the calendar. I owed the British crowd that,” Kerr told TNT Sports.Born in Scotland’s capital Edinburgh, Kerr secured the win in front of a home crowd. “This is absolutely incredible to do it in front of a Scottish crowd,” he added.That Kerr’s winning time was slower than what Myers had produced to qualify for the final proved how tactical the affair was. Tshepiso Masalela of Botswana led them through 400m in 59.74s, about five seconds slower than Kerr’s world-record lap splits in London in mid-July.Myers made sure to stay on Kerr’s tail, with the Scottish athlete content to hold his position in the middle of the pack. By halfway (800m), the field was packed together, with athletes running wide into lane three. Space was at a premium, which is why Team England athlete Thomas Keen briefly found himself nudged from lane one into the infield.Coming along the home straight for the penultimate time, Kerr made a surge to the front to follow Myers. They hit the bell in 3:00.49s. Jake Wightman, another former 1,500m world champion and Team Scotland runner, went with Kerr and Myers.In the end, Kerr won by more than second as the battle for the other two medals went on behind him. That world-record shape from London — where he ran 3:42.66s and broke the world record of Hicham El Guerrouj from 1999 — proved to be the difference. He closed harder than everyone else, with a 54-second last lap, and outstretched his arms in celebration as he crossed the line.“When you’re running that slow, your job is to not waste energy, and I did that well. I knew an opportunity would open up. I had enough energy where I could put a gap on them in the last 200m,” Kerr told TNT Sports, adding that his world record in London had been a “big stretch”, with this race requiring more from his brain than his body.It crowns an excellent season for Kerr. He won the 3,000m world indoor title in March, which proved a remarkable return to fitness six months following a calf tear in the 1,500m final at the World Championships. Then, close to four months out from the London Diamond League, he went public with Project 222, named after the number of seconds he intended to run the mile (1,609m) in.Since the start of 2023, he has earned five global medals from six finals, only beaten over 1,500m at the last Olympics (by Cole Hocker of the United States) and when injury forced him to jog over the line last September. Kerr follows in the footsteps of compatriot Laura Muir, who won 1,500m Commonwealth gold in Birmingham four years ago, while a British man now holds the men’s equivalent for the first time since Peter Elliot (for Team England) in 1990.Kerr will not be part of the Great Britain team at the European Championships later this month, with coach Danny Mackey telling The Athletic earlier this year that he wanted his athlete to have “one or two more races” after his record attempt in London. He could yet have a shot at the 1,500m world record at the Zurich Diamond League, with El Guerrouj’s 3:26.00s run from 1998 still standing.