Geoff and Katharine will be our Guests of Honour for 4J Annual Awards

Tuesday 13th September 2022

Our 4J Annual Awards Dinner is coming up next month – and we’re delighted to confirm our Guests of Honour for our celebration in Glasgow on Saturday 29 October.

And for 2022 it will be a ‘double act’ with Geoff Wightman and Katharine Merry, two of the voices of athletics in Britain and beyond, attending our big night at the Hilton Hotel.

Geoff and Katharine will help us present our Athlete of the Year award and other accolades.

It’s certain to be a highly entertaining evening with Bryan Burnett once again our capable host and tickets (priced £50 per person) are now on sale online.

Stadium commentator/coach Geoff is no stranger to these shores, of course, having served as our chief executive at one stage and his fame spread far and wide this summer when commentating in Oregon on his son Jake’s superb World Champs Men’s 1500m gold.

Olympic 400m medallist Merry broke new ground when she became the first in-stadium female commentator at the Olympics last year and Katharine has huge admiration for the sport in Scotland as well as our jogscotland programme.

The 4J Annual Awards reflect, acknowledge and recognise the sport beyond simply the big names with presentations to Coaches, Clubs, Volunteers and Officials. We will be releasing short-lists in a number of categories soon.

‘I’m delighted to be invited to attend the 4J Annual Awards Dinner in a Guest of Honour role,’ said Geoff.

‘I’ve been to the event a number of times – in a few roles and going back a number of years.

‘But I do strongly suspect the 2022 celebrations will be a bit special because, after all, it has been a really remarkable year for athletics in Scotland. It’s been so exciting to see success come across a range of disciplines and events.

‘I am really looking forward to helping reflect on that and also celebrate with the wider sport – because the elite end performances simply don’t happen without the volunteers at grassroots.’

‘It is a real pleasure for me to be invited to your 4J Annual Awards and I am really looking forward to it,’ said Katharine Merry.

‘Geoff doubtless has to declare an interest, but I think Scottish Athlete of the Year this year could be pretty interesting! Athletes will be doing pretty well to make the short-list, put it that way.

‘It’s brilliant the performances have set the bar so high and I have been so impressed.

‘There have been many highlights but for Team Scotland to come away with eight medals at Birmingham was tremendous and I understand the best in athletics for 40 years.

‘I actually think that accurately reflects the status of the current group of athletes headlined by Jake Wightman, Laura Muir and Eilish McColgan.

‘I look forward to celebrating awards in all the categories, too, and the contribution of Clubs, Coaches, Officials and Volunteers to our sport can never be under-estimated.

‘It will also be great to celebrate with the jogscotland community. I’m back running 10ks and 5k myself and we all know the positive benefits – physically and mentally – of getting out for a run. I look forward to finding out more about that programme.’