Euro Trials: Sefton Park, Liverpool

Predicted Senior GB Team:

Riley - pre-selected

Farah - Has a shot at a Euro xc medal if he runs well

S Vernon - based on current form will make team

F Tickner - If not injured will make team

Thompson - would be surprised if he didn't make the team

Possible Outsiders

McCormick, Warmby, Skinner, Ford, Bowden, Mays, Bannsiter, Ward, Heywood, A Vernon and there is obviously others!!!

no chance for me as im not doing it. doing leeds abbey dash instead.

Riley is pre-selected. Farah, Thompson and McCormick are certain to make the team. The last two places are more difficult. 2 Vernons, Tickner, Warmby, Lemoncello, plus a number of others including Bannister.

Women. Two Yellings and Pavey. Then three from maybe ten others. Dean, Blizzard, Clitheroe, Wilkinson, Reed, ...

Any predictions for the U-20 team?

I think it will be Carey, Bilham, Deighton, Hickey, Timmins and Goose.

no ones making any u23 predictions...

Seniors dont forget the staffs boys Tom Humphries and Lee Turner

U23's Andy Baker, Ryan McCleod, Mark Draper

How about that Turner guy. If he can run that well in his first race whats he gonna do in a few weeks time if he does the trial!

Heard he used to run as a junior but gave up a few years ago. I presume he was a top runner as a junior then, does anyone know anything about him? To run quicker than the likes of Bowden, Bannister, Ford in your first race for years is unbelievable.

U23 idea is a joke, whats the point, lets have U26 and U29 aswell!

What about the 19 year old girl from Durham Uni who was only seconds behind Yellings at the weekend.Seems she is a newcomer, plays football, hockey and rugby,started running about 5 weeks ago,has blown away most of the north east women by 2 minutes in some races and hardly gets a mention from anyone.They've even got her name wrong in the results.If her name was Pigeon we would have heard loads about her by now.

voy wrote:

What about the 19 year old girl from Durham Uni who was only seconds behind Yellings at the weekend.Seems she is a newcomer, plays football, hockey and rugby,started running about 5 weeks ago,has blown away most of the north east women by 2 minutes in some races and hardly gets a mention from anyone.They've even got her name wrong in the results.If her name was Pigeon we would have heard loads about her by now.

Not that you'd ever get anyone's name wrong.

crapper wrote:

U23 idea is a joke, whats the point, lets have U26 and U29 aswell!

no its not a joke you fool!

as there is such a high drop out rate from junior to senior age group, the new u23 event can provide an incentive to keep these people in the sport at a very difficult time in their young lives. with there only being two u23s (vernon and humphreys) with any realistic propspect of making the senior team, i consider the u23s event to provide great chance for some athletes who may not have had great success as juniors to shine through!

in other words those not good enough to make the senior team but too old for the juniors, we never had this when we had good seniors, If you don't want it enough you'll quit, if you do, you won't.

Turner use to run for City of Stoke A.C until 2003, im sure a lot of students will remember his last race going from dead last to about 5th or 6th I remember in the last 200m.

He quit the sport then but is now back and really really hungry for success

Question: why not address this drop-out rate instead of having a new category? What are the reasons behind it? If UKa would address then then the future might be a little rosier. Right now with regards to world standards the U23s bears little comparison. So look at the problem and fix it.

This age group has been in place for a number of years now - there is an under 23 European Champs on the track. Is there any evidence that it is helping athletes progress through to World Class senior standard?

Without seeming to hark back to the "old days", Seb Coe set 3 World Records at age 22. He didn't need any help with "transition to senior competition" - just got on with it! Perhaps rather than "sheltering" athletes from senior competition, work with them supporting them when times are tough (injuries, exams, etc) whilst helping them see what they have to do to reach the very top.

With the introduction of "Masters" at age 35, the senior age group seems to have been somewhat reduced in its length. Next we'll be like sports like triathlon where there are five year age groups thus giving more chance of people calling themselves a "winner".

We are already making things softer for Europeans by having this championship, when a European rarely makes the top 15 in the senior long race at WXC it is a poor race, in my opinion it does more harm than good, athlete are expected to hold form for 4 months through to WXC, a long long winter, periodization is not possible, people should be concentrating on getting good base in now not being race fit. It has screwed the whole layout of the year.

If the U23 is such a ood idea why is there no world U23 champs? bBecause the rest of the world doesn't need further incentives, they are concentrating on being good seniors, do people really need to be drip fed success to stay in the sport?

I can see the point of U23 as a stepping stone. It's not meant to be as big as the senior or junior age groups.

M35 is a bit of a laugh though - especially as I'm alarmingly close to being a master now. But the Masters are always going to vote to widen their mandate rather than narrow it.

Lots of age bands seems to work well in triathlon in terms of giving people targets to aim at, clear stepping stones and maintaining interest. It seems better than the absolute mess of conflicting competitions in athletics. I think Athletics has a lot to learn from triathlon.

Back on topic I've just entered for Liverpool - does anyone else think it's the dodgiest entry system they've ever used?

I had a survey from UKA back asking if I'd buy product from a store at the UKA website. No way if the payment system is anything like that.

I think that there are a number of reasons why the sport does not have enough young athletes prepared to train hard for success. Over the last 20 years the sport has not recognised the changes that have taken place, and nobody has addressed them. Because of the way the sport was organised (or not) through clubs, counties/districts, areas, Home Countries and then some sort of UK body - it has never been clear who was responsible for what.

Who should have noticed that the number of keen young athletes in clubs was dropping each year - surely the clubs job ? If they couldnt reverse the trend, who should have helped them - county or area assoc ? Whatever should have happened clearly didnt. Under the new structure it is clear where responsibility lies. Lets hope that someone is on the job already.

As for U23, I know a couple of good athletes who are currently movitated by the prospect of running in an U23 comp so it cant be all bad. They might just continue to train and race hard rather than bag it and get a proper job !

Shes already been told she has a place in the u23 team if she wants it!! and to put the record straight she only plays hockey not football and rugby!! and she didnt 'blow away most of the north east women by 2 minutes' as none of the regions top females were racing that day!!

For what its worth I think she should stake a claim for a place in the senior team rather than the U23's!!