Athletics: Twell's at the head of affairs again . .

Published on Thursday 6 January 2011 11:45

Scotland's Commonwealth Games 1500 metres bronze medallist Steph Twell returns to one of her favourite venues when she competes in the women's 6k race in tomorrow's BUPA Great Edinburgh Cross in Holyrood Park.

Fourth on the last two occasions, the 21-year-old Aldershot star, who revealed that she had delayed by a week departing for a spell of altitude training in Kenya especially to take part, is cautious about predicting where she might finish this time, especially when facing even fiercer opposition than before.

"I'll be really happy if I come in the top eight - I'm not quite where I was fitness-wise last year - 2010 was a really long season and it's taking a while to get back to where I want to be.

"But I love racing in Edinburgh which I've done for the last three years - it's a great course, great for the crowd who give me great support. I'll try to stay in touch with the race and then not do what I did in Portugal (at the European Championships last month) when I tried to move up too quickly."

Twell, three times the European junior cross country champion, slipped back to 20th and third Briton in Portugal, revealed that she mnight try to track Jessica Augusto for as long as possible in tomorrow's race: "I've still to discuss my tactics with my coach (Mick Woods)," she said before starting another training session in Aldershot last night.

Now a full-time athlete, having recently graduated with a strength and conditioning science degree from St Mary's University in Twickenham, Twell is convinced she has made a good move which will give her more time for recovery and pay off in the long term. "I did start a job but I was physically exhausted," she says.

Twell was disappointed to hear that her Commonwealth Games team-mate, Edinburgh's own Freya Murray, has been forced to pull out of tomorrow's race due to the Achilles tendon trouble which flared up after her valiant 10 miler in the Great South Run shortly after she returned from Delhi.

"I want to make sure I'm fit for the World Cross Country Championships in March so don't want to take any chances now," explained Murray, a 27-year-old Newcastle-based structural engineer.

Twell, who leaves for Kenya's Rift Valley on Monday for her first experiment with altitude training, is less concerned with the cross country World Championships, though she will go if picked, more the track Worlds in Daegu, South Korea next September, a point her coach Mick Woods is keen to hammer home: "There's a bigger picture and we need to get the track season right - Steph's not quite where she needs to be at this point in time so she may not challenge as she has in the past."But I hope she'll come down from Kenya in better shape."

"She's not unfit," he stressed, "but doing a lot of work and mentally perhaps not ready to attack it. With Daegu in September there's another fairly long track season ahead and she'll be concentrating on making the team at 1500 metres."

Tomorrow's entry list includes three impressive Kenyans, Vivian Cheriuyot, Linet Masai (the respective World 5000m and 10,000m champions), and Milcah Chemos, the Commonwealth steeplechase champion, who are joined by the Ethiopian Genzebe Dibaba, twice the World junior cross country champion and sister of Turanesh, (twice a winner in Edinburgh), and Augusto, the runaway winner of the recent European Championship in her native Portugal.

Hatti Dean, Britain's top finisher in Portugal and Liz Yelling, twice an Olympic marathon runner, are also there.

The race incorporates the Scottish Inter-District Championship with Sarah Inglis (Lothian) and Jennifer MacLean, Laura Dunn and Sraha Hood (all EAC) among those named in the East team.

Perhaps in an attempt to disguise the overwhelming superiority of the Kenyan men, Eliud Kipchoge, the former World champion and Olmypic 5000m silver medallist and a former Edinburgh winner, goes in a 4k race with fellow countrymen Asbel Kiprop and Brima Kipruto and Britain's number one 1500m runner last season Tom Lancashire.

Meanwhile, Britain's Athlete of the Year Mo Farahleads a GB and Northern Ireland team in the international 8k race against the USA, led by their outstanding Galen Rupp, and a European Select led by the Ukrainian Sergey Lebid, who captured the European title for an incredible ninth time in Portugal.

Lebid defeated Farah in a great head-to-head over 4k at Holyrood back in 2007 and no doubt the organisers will be hoping for a repeat battle.

Sadly there is no Scot in the GB men's side, but Scottish champion Al Hay (Central), winner of the Portobello Promethon on New Year's Day and runner-up Ross Matheson (Lasswade) are both in the East team. Local athletes should also be out in force in the various Inter-District races.

Timetable: 10.15am u/13 girls; 10.35 u/ boys; 11.10 u/15 girls; 11.30 u/15 boys; 12.15pm u/17 women; 12.30 u/17 men; 13.25 senior women; 13.55 senior men (8k).