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World Championships relay medallist and European indoor silver-medal winner Eilidh Child has been hailed Scotland’s Athlete of the Year.
But the Kinross athlete and 2014 Commonwealth Games poster girl wasted no time in getting back to the track for training after being honoured at the Glasgow event over the weekend.
The London Olympian and former Perth Grammar School PE teacher admitted the 2013 season was beyond her wildest dreams but she insists there is plenty more in the tank. Child has always known that hurdlers mature later than other track competitors and, at 26, she is edging towards her prime.
She picked up the KUKRI Scottish award for the second time in her career and said: “If you’d said to me at the start of the year that I’d get a gold and a silver from the European Indoors, you’ll be fifth at the world championships in the hurdles and get a bronze from the relay, I’d have taken it.
“But as the season went on, my goals started to change a little bit. In the indoor season, I surprised myself. I knew I had the flat speed. I just had to get my hurdling right. I got that right more times that I got it wrong but there’s still more that I can do. Hopefully next year I can nail it all the time and build on it.”
She also won the 400m hurdles at the European Team Championships in Gateshead.
Child saw off the challenge of Eilish McColgan, Laura Muir, Libby Clegg, Susan Partridge and Chris O’Hare.
“Eilidh is Athlete of the Year and I think very deservedly so,” said scottishathletics director of coaching Stephen Maguire. “To put it bluntly: she has upped her game in 2013. Eilidh was a little disappointed, to say the least, with her London 2012 performance, when she went out at the semi-final stage in the 400m hurdles.
“The clear objective for this year was to reach the final in Moscow and start to make a name for herself at the top level on the world stage.”
It was also a memorable night for fellow Kinross athlete and student vet Laura Muir, who picked up a trophy for achieving distinction in Scottish athletics, after reaching the 800m semi-finals at the World Champs in Moscow.
Credit: Daily Record
