364 days ago, in the Polish coastal city of Sopot, Laura Muir dived headlong into the world indoor championships with justifiably lofty expectations but emerged inconsolable, following a first-round exit, in a sea of tears.

Learn from these moments, urged past greats Colin Jackson and Denise Lewis, who were among those to quickly offer reassurance. At both the subsequent Commonwealth Games and European Championships, it seemed as though the Glasgow University student was struggling to put theory into practice. It is when medals are on the line and the spotlight is one that we discover who will sink or swim.

A year on, Muir has come to Prague for the European Indoors with her floatation device strapped on tightly. "'I learnt a lot from that," she declares. "That's been one of the hardest things, seeing people of a similar age to me getting medals. That's been tough.

"But now having gone through a pretty tough year of competitions, I feel ready. Maybe Andy (Young), my coach, would say I've had my breakthrough year in 2014 because of the times I did. But I felt not getting medals was disappointing and this feels like an opportunity to get the first senior medal in the bag."

It is, as it always is, a work in progress. As a teen growing up in the picturesque Perthshire village of Milnathort, Muir - by her own admission - never viewed herself as an athletic high-achiever. Signs of prodigiousness were noticeably absent with her emergence two years ago coming as a minor surprise.

That has meant getting up to speed on the art of bravado, of enshrining a mindset that breeds expectation, not hope. "You've got to have a complete personality change when you get out on the track," she confirms.

"Maybe I struggled with that before but now I definitely I know what I want and I'll do what I need to get to the line as fast as possible. You've got to try different things in races but I'm going to get into the position I need to be. Other people will try and knock you off. You try to hold it and not back down. I'm not perfect at it yet but I'm getting there."

At 21, and with her studies in veterinary science scaled back to afford extra time for training and recovery, she senses an opportunity to right past wrongs. Going into this afternoon's 3000 metres semi-finals ranked second after the late withdrawal of rival Sifan Hassan, her build-up has brought ups and downs, with a UK title over 1500m preceded by an outing in Stockholm that bore all the hallmarks of 2014's mis-steps. If the Czech capital results in a mission accomplished, it will be because she does not lose a battle of wits.

"I did start to see a psychologist towards the end of last year," Muir reveals. "It's not something I'd ever done before but I wanted to try it and he gave me a couple of ideas, mostly about how if I wanted a race, I had to go out and grab it myself.

"It did help. But for me, that already comes from me rather than needing to get it from someone else. Andy also helped me. He tells me, 'you're running for you and no-one else. So if you want it, go get it.'"