UKA yesterday announced the full team for the forthcoming European Youth Olympic Trials (EYOT) in Moscow on 21-23 May, including Victoria Ohuruogu (coach: Lloyd Cowan) younger sister of 2008 Olympic 400m gold medallist Christine.

Ohuruogu, who stepped up from 300m to 400m this year and proceeded to win the Aviva England 400m indoor U20 Championships, will travel to the Russian capital, as part of a 22 strong team, to compete in the trials which will act as qualification for the IOC Youth Olympic Games (YOG), in Singapore 14-26 August.
Annie Tagoe (coach: Connie Henry, Clarence Calendar), who will contest the 100m, received the SPAR outstanding achievement award at the 2009 UKA Awards Dinner after winning both the 100m and 200m at the England U17 Championships in Bedford. (more…)

UKA and the London Marathon today announced a funding partnership which will further enhance the successful UKA Endurance Programme and help to produce world class British distance athletes.

London Marathon have agreed to an annual investment up to £150,000 which will be added to UKA’s existing significant investment into the Endurance Programme, which has been developed over the past year under the leadership of Ian Stewart.

The funding will be used to help finance altitude training camps in Iten, Kenya and Font Romeu, France, both established altitude training centres which are proven to have physiological benefits for endurance athletes. Font Romeu has long been the European base for Paula Radcliffe, whilst Iten is host to many of the world’s leading distance athletes. (more…)

On Track Athletics has been asked by Justiming to support their Spring Open Meetings at Dartford by providing event management support.

Justiming are staging two open meetings in April on Sunday 11th April and Sunday 25th April at Dartford Athletics Track both starting at 12pm. The events will include international standard photo-finish timing equipment and LED Scoreboard. Athletes can Enter Online, by Entry Form or on the day.

Details of the events are below: (more…)

UKA today announced that Britain’s track and field athletes will be given a unique opportunity to prepare for the London 2012 home Games with the laying of the Olympic track at the two UKA National Performance Centres at Lee Valley and Loughborough.

The London Marathon Charitable Trust has committed £220,000 to enable UKA, with the support of Lee Valley Regional Park Authority and Loughborough University, to lay an exact replica of the Mondo FX track that will be in the Olympic Stadium in 2012.

The super fast track, which will be in place at the facilities from April, is currently installed in only ten stadia around the world with two of those in Beijing. UKA’s Lee Valley Athletics Centre Director Dan Pfaff said: “The two National Performance Centres will be the only training centres in the world with this track installed, giving our athletes considerable advantage. (more…)

The Kent County Athletics Championships is being held at The Julie Rose Stadium in Ashford on Saturday 8th and Sunday 9th May 2010.

Download the Kent Athletics Outdoor Championships 2010 – Entry Form

UKA, the national governing body for athletics, today welcomed the start of the process that will decide the future of the Olympic Stadium.

The Olympic Park Legacy Company (OPLC) has begun a global search for the organisations that are interested in managing, operating in, or locating to the Stadium after the London 2012 Games with the publication of an ‘expressions of interest’ document.

Organisations or consortia will have eight weeks to come forward with their interest and initial views. This could include sporting, community, education, visitor attraction and commercial uses.

Deciding the future of the iconic centrepiece is one of the Company’s top priorities and OPLC’s aim is to reach a settled position by the end of March 2011.UKA Chairman Ed Warner, who has worked closely with the OPLC said: “UKA is delighted that this process is underway and that the bid promise of an athletics legacy is central to it. We look forward to working closely with all significant parties to ensure that athletics will be at the heart of a vibrant stadium in legacy mode.

“As the national governing body for the sport, internationally recognised by the IAAF and European Athletics, UKA will work with the OPLC and any other future operator to ensure international world class athletics events are staged alongside those already scheduled for the stadium such as the Aviva London Grand Prix – part of the prestigious Diamond League – right through to domestic championships for athletes of all ages.

UKA today announced European Indoor 3000m champion Mo Farah (Ricky Simms) and European Cross Country Champion Hayley Yelling (Conrad Milton) are amongst twenty one athletes selected for the Aviva Great Britain and Northern Ireland team for the IAAF World Cross Country Championships to be held in Bydgoszcz, Poland on 28 March.

European Indoor 3000m champion Farah, who won the McCain Cross Challenge final and trials event in Cofton Park, Birmingham on 13 March returned to the UK in great shape following a long phase of altitude training in Kenya. (more…)

Welsh Shot putter Ryan Spencer-Jones made his intentions for the Delhi games clear as he threw a new personal best and Commonwealth Games qualifying mark of 17.92m at the UWIC Inter-University match on Sunday 7th March. The measure handsomely beat the qualifying criteria, set at 17.75m, and is testimony to the state of form of Spencer-Jones, who has now improved his personal best from 2009 (16.79m) on three occasions indoors in 2010 – 17.32m in January, 17.57m in February and now 17.92m in March.

Ryan is coached by Welsh Javelin record holder Nigel Bevan, who also coaches Discus champion Brett Morse. Bevan represented Great Britain at the 1992 Olympic Games in Barcelona, and competed for Wales at the 1990 and 1994 Commonwealth Games.

Double sprint World record holder Usain Bolt produced two stunning anchor leg runs, but came up short on one occasion at Saturday’s (27) Gibson Relays in Kingston.

The most impressive of the anchor leg runs came in the 4×400m Relay, which saw him getting the baton in fourth about some 20 metres behind. However, despite making up a lot of ground on the leaders, some of whom he passed, his 43.58 split was not enough as UTech held on for the victory in 3:05.33.

Bolt took his team across the line in 3:05.77 ahead of the Jermaine Gonzales-led Racers Track Club (3:06.55).

Earlier, Bolt anchored his team to victory in the 4×100m. Yohan Blake, Marvin Anderson and Kenroy Anderson were a part of the team with Bolt that ran 38.08 ahead of Racer’s B with Antigua’s Daniel Bailey.

Bolt at the time told journalists, “we just went out to have fun (in the 4×100m). We (Racers Track Club) had two teams in the final, so it wasn’t about proving anything. It was about fun.”

“The real race would be in the 4×400m where sprinters will square off with quarter-milers,” said Bolt, who holds the 100m and 200m World records at 9.58 and 19.19.

View Full Results from the Gibson Relays Meet

The official team selected to represent Great Britain at the 13th IAAF World Indoor Championships in Doha (12 – 14 March) was announced yesterday as the following:

Men
60m Dwain Chambers, Harry Aikines-Aryeetey
400m Richard Buck, Dale Garland
800m Andrew Osagie, Ed Aston
1500m Tim Bayley
3,000m Scott Overall
4×400m Richard Buck, Dale Garland, Chris Clarke, Nigel Levine, Conrad Williams, Luke Lennon-Ford
High jump Samson Oni, Tom Parsons
Pole vault Steve Lewis
Long jump Greg Rutherford, Chris Tomlinson
Triple jump Phillips Idowu
Shot Carl Myerscough

Women
60m Joice Maduaka
800m Jenny Meadows, Vicky Griffiths
1500m Helen Clitheroe, Charlotte Best
3,000m Gemma Turtle, Barbara Parker
60m hurdles Gemma Bennett
4×400m Victoria Barr, Hayley Jones, Dawn Hunt, Lee McConnell, Perri Shakes-Drayton, Kim Wall
High jump Vikki Hubbard
Pole vault Kate Dennison
Pentathlon Jessica Ennis