Athletics: Nisbet giving Nuttall the nod to raise bar in Bedford

Capital high jumper Emma Nuttall (Edinburgh AC) is certainly hoping to rise to the occasion when she opens her outdoor season at Bedford on Sunday.

The 18-year-old Strathclyde University history student is just back from Canada where she was visiting her coach Laurier Primeaux, who resigned earlier this year and has moved back to Vancouver. Nuttall leads the Scottish rankings for the year so far with her indoor Scottish Native record-equalling 1.83m she cleared at the Kelvin Hall two months ago. EAC team-mate Jayne Nisbet, who was second to Nuttall that day with 1.80m and is no longer eligible for the BUCS event, is backing Nuttall to win at Bedford: "I'm keeping my fingers crossed," she said. Nisbet is opening her outdoor season at the Loughborough International trial at Scotstoun, Glasgow on May 8.

"I got in a lot of good warm weather training in Portugal," she says. Nisbet's boyfriend, Scottish pole vault internationalist Richard Hurren, who ruptured an Achilles tendon at the same Scottish Indoor Championships in February, has had his plaster cast removed. He's slowly allowed to start walking again but he'll be with crutches for a while," reports Nisbet, who works as a personal fitness trainer in Loughborough.