Manchester Middle Distance Project back for 2019

Thursday 4th April 2019

scottishathletics are keen to advise athletes, coaches and parents that we intend to continue our Middle Distance Project again this summer.

The goals of the project are to accelerate the development of male and female Scottish athletes over 800m, 1500m and 3000m.

To that end, we plan to send a minibus of athletes/coaches down to the British Miler Club Gold Standard Races (North) at Longford Park Stadium, Manchester, over the 2019 summer season.

It’s being planned in order to encourage their progression and development by assisting them to participate in a challenging competition environment.

The programme is primarily aimed at senior school pupils, further education students and late developing Seniors – as well as their coaches.

We are putting the information out now – in terms of the dates – to assist athletes/coaches with the planning process; and we are now looking for expressions of interest for the project.

Please email Mark Pollard by Monday 22 April at the latest on mark.pollard@scottishathletics.org.uk

The key dates for the ‘Trafford Tuesday’ Meetings in 2019 are:

Tue 14 May; Tue 4 June; Tue 18 June; Tue 23 July; Tue 20 August

The provisional standards for being involved in the project in 2019 are:

Male 800m: sub 1:56 runners only (of which there were 33 athletes in Scotland 2018)

Male 1500m: sub 4:00 runners only (of which there were 48 athletes in Scotland 2018)

Male 3000m: sub 9:00 runners only (of which there were 59 athletes in Scotland 2018)

Female 800m: sub 2:16 runners only (of which there were 32 athletes in Scotland 2018)

Female 1500m: sub 4:40 runners only (of which there were 34 athletes in Scotland 2018)

Female 3000m: sub 10:20 runners only (of which there were 37 athletes in Scotland 2018)

Depending on the level of uptake, coaches and athletes may need to prioritise the dates they would like to compete on – to ensure as many athletes as possible are given the opportunity to participate in the project.