Athletics: Sprinter Smith to miss New Year run due to flit abroad

Scotland's top sprinter Nick Smith is re-locating to New Zealand shortly in a bid to breathe new life into his athletics career and will miss the New Year professional gala which he has plundered regularly in recent years as he mopped up the top scratch prizes.

Smith won the big sprint ten years ago at the age of only 18, the youngest ever winner at the time, and has been supporting the meeting ever since, though in recent years concentrating on the scratch and short limit events.

He will be away for most of 2011 and will also miss all the major championships including the Scottish Indoors and Outdoors where he is the defending champion.

The Stewart's Melville FP, who is coached by former British professional sprint champion Stuart Hogg, has been six times Scottish 100 metres champion and won the Scottish Indoor 60 metres title for a record seventh time at Kelvin Hall last winter.

He went on to smash Elliot Bunney's Scottish National record.

"I'll be away for at least six to eight months - I just need a bit of a change," says Smith, who was desperately disappointed to miss out on Scotland's team for the Commonwealth Games in Delhi last month as he had not made the qualifying time.

Smith, who will also attend his elder sister Julie's wedding in Christchurch, has been taking a course in Edinburgh to become a personal fitness trainer, a career he hopes to pursue at least part-time over there.

"I'm going to try to get as many races as I can in New Zealand - it's a great country and I've been in touch with some people including a coach who has a group of sprinters I can work with," he added.

"It's going to be quite a bit of a challenge for me but I still believe I can sneak back into a GB team in future, though it's difficult under the system now."

Having taken the Scottish 100m title in 2002 and 2003, Smith went to the Athens Olympics in 2004 as a member of the British 4 x 100 metres relay squad but failed to get a run. His career then took a dip until he returned to his first coach Hogg, who steered him to the last four National 100 metres titles in a row.

Smith, 28 next month, has no intention of retiring and has not ruled out bidding for a place at the 2014 Commonwealth Games in Glasgow.