Athletics: Learmonth vows to attack his 800m like 'last race he'll run'

With only two Scots - Sarah Kelly and Laura Kenney - in the Great Britain team for tomorrow's Aviva International athletics meeting at Glasgow's Kelvin Hall, events in Cardiff on Sunday might conceivably have a bigger bearing on Scotland's preparations for Glasgow 2014.

The annual Celtic Nations Under-20 Indoor International will feature a number of hopefuls, notably Lasswade's Guy Learmonth, who began the new indoor season last weekend as he did last year - in spectacular form.

The 18-year-old Loughborough University student clocked 1:51.29 in a virtual solo 800 metres victory at the new Scottish Open in Glasgow and wants to go even faster in Wales on Sunday: "I'm definitely going for sub 1:50. I'm going to attack it as if it's the last race I ever run," said Learmonth in his usual forthright fashion.

"I expect my times to come down dramatically as the season progresses."

Coach Henry Gray confirms that Learmonth is in great shape and is enjoying his move to the Midlands.

Another young Scot who has started the season brightly is Capital high jumper Emma Nuttall, who cleared a personal best of 1.8m last Sunday. Now a student in Glasgow, Nuttall (Edinburgh AC) has been benefiting from training at Kelvin Hall but there is no women's high jump in tomorrow's programme where she might have been given a guest spot.

Another 18-year-old, former Cupar schoolgirl Sarah Kelly, has been catapulted straight into the GB match place for the 1500m in Glasgow. Though she has a very respectable time of 4:04.15 for the distance, Kelly is better known for her 800m performance of reaching the final of the World Junior Championships in Canada last July where she clocked a fast 2:02.89 which in 2010 ranked her just behind Scotland's 1500m bronze medallist in Delhi, Steph Twell and ahead of Claire Gibson, who ran the 800m for Scotland in Delhi.

Anglo Scot Laura Kenney, who has been slightly in the shadow of Twell and Scotland's other fine distance runner Freya Murray, goes in the 3000m and is certainly capable of being in the mix. " I love running in Glasgow where the crowd always gives great support," said Kenney.

Pick of the action on the boards, which again features a match between Team GB, USA, Sweden and a Commonwealth Select, should be the return clash of World heptathlon champion Jessica Ennis and American sprint ace Lola Jones in the 60m hurdles.

Jones will be out for revenge over the multi-talented Sheffield star who convincingly beat her in her specialist event last year. But Ennis will also be competing in the long jump.

The men's 60m hurdles should be equally tasty with Britain's European champion Andy Turner facing the mighty David Oliver (USA) and the Swede Robert Kronberg, while European 100m silver medalist Mark Lewis Francis and former Commonwealth champion Kim Collins are in the 60m and 200m respectively. Back after injury comes Britain's World silver medallist Jenny Meadows in the 800m.