Athletics story by Vinnie Mitchell, Mon, 21 Nov 2005 11:36:01 GMT


LONDON - Dave Collins, the UK Athletics performance director has confirmed that the number of athletes who receive Lottery funding will drop from 65 to 38 and could further drop by 17 before next year's outdoor events.

"If I have a mature athlete then the World Class Programme is the only route I can fund them through," Collins commented. "But if I have an up-and-coming athlete I can access other funding packages that give them the same, or even better levels of support." This means that star athletes like Darren Campbell, or Ashia Hansen could be ditched although their names figure on the list at the moment. Hansen will not be fit for defending her Commonwealth Triple jump title in March next year.

"There are 16 to 17 athletes on the programme who have been warned that they have to up their levels of performance in the next six months to stay on," Collins confirmed. Rhys Williams, the 400m hurdler finds himself out of the list released yesterday.

Collins hopes to identify potential medal winners or even finalists at the Beijing Olympics in 2008 and back them to the hilt. Hence this pruning task to make sure that these contenders have adequate funding as opposed to paltry grants.

The group of 38 has been split into three groups; Group A, athletes will receive £21,830 each a year, (athletes who are Olympic or World Championship medal-winners.) Group B athletes will receive £17,830 and Group C, athletes will receive £8,915 each year.

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