Newyddion
Microplus UK Athletics Indoor Championships 2025 - Preview
20/02/2025 00:00, I Mewn Blog /
Around 40 Welsh athletes will head to Birmingham this weekend to compete at the Microplus UK Athletics Indoor Championships.
Those taking part across Saturday and Sunday range in experience from Paralympic champions to rising young talent on the Welsh Athletics pathway programme.
As well as national titles, places on the Great Britain team for next month’s European Athletics Championships will be up for grabs.
Among those hoping to secure medals and places on the plane to Apeldoorn will be Melissa Courtney-Bryant (Poole AC) and Justin Davies (Team Bath) who already have the qualifying standards.
The top two places at a packed Utilita Arena will secure automatic spots on the GB team heading for the Netherlands.
Courtney-Bryant made the athletics world sit up and take notice earlier this month in Boston when she smashed her personal best and Welsh 3,000m record by nine seconds.
The time of 8:28.69 was a new world lead for the distance this year and gave Courtney-Bryant the qualifying standard for both the European and World indoor championships.
Also lining up will be Cari Hughes (Cardiff Athletics) who has been edging towards the qualifying standards since the start of this year with a series of excellent performances across Europe.
They will face stern opposition however with the likes of double European Indoor 3,000m champion Laura Muir and European Under-20 cross country champion Innes FitzGerald also in the field.
Meanwhile, Davies will go into the championships in a confident mood having last week gained the European qualifying standard and broken the Welsh indoor 800m record at the same venue.
The 22-year-old produced a brilliant run at the Keely Klassic to claim victory in 1:45.78 and will be hoping to reproduce that form over the same distance this weekend.
Davies will be joined in the 800m heats by Welsh 1500m champion Ben Reynolds (Cardiff Athletics) and promising National Development Programme (NDP) athlete Jack Organ (Brecon AC).
The men’s 1500m will feature another middle distance athlete who broke a Welsh record at the Keely Klassic. Piers Copeland (Pontypridd Roadents) clocked a new national 1,000m record of 2:19.73. Clubmate James Heneghan will also be toeing the line.
In the women's 1500m, Emily Belgrave (Belgrave Harriers) will be returning to the Indoor Championships looking to improve on her time of 4:26.75 she recorded at the Championships this time last year.
A third Welsh record breaker from last weekend will be in action in Birmingham. Multi-eventer Abi Pawlett (Trafford) lowered Kay Morley-Brown’s 33-year-old Welsh 60m hurdles record in Sheffield.
Pawlett’s time of 8.11 was also a UK lead this year. She will be joined over the hurdles by fellow Welsh multi-eventers Lauren Evans (Cardiff Athletics), who represented Wales at the 2022 Commonwealth Games, and Grace Morgan (Cardiff Archers) who ran a PB in Sheffield.
Pawlett will also compete in the women’s shot, where the field will include Wales’ reigning Paralympic champion Sabrina Fortune (Deeside AAC), who proved her continued form by winning the Welsh indoor title last month.
Another hugely successful Welsh para athlete will be lining up in the men’s shot put. Prolific Paralympic and World Para Athletics Championships gold medallist Aled Davies (Cardiff Athletics) is entered alongside Welsh Indoor Champion Patrick Swan (Cornwall AC), who won silver at last year’s UK indoors.
A Welsh Olympian is amongst the entries for the men’s 200m where Joe Brier (Swansea Harriers) will be hoping to open his indoor season in style.
Alongside the Tokyo Games 4x400m relay runner will be rising young Welsh sprint stars Alex Azu (Cardiff Athletics), Joe Berry (Newport Harriers) and Aron Tugwell (Cardiff Archers).
Azu, brother of Olympic bronze medallist Jeremiah, also contests the men’s 60m with fellow Cardiff Athletics speed merchants Sam Gordon and Lewis Stephens.
The men’s 60m hurdles boasts a particularly strong Welsh flavour with three athletes competing.
They will be led by NDP athlete Iolo Grant (Cardiff Archers), who heads the UK under-20 rankings so far this year. Grant will be joined by multi-eventers Toks Akanbi-Mortimer (Cardiff Athletics) and Evan Cole (Swansea Harriers).
Likewise, there is a significant Welsh contingent in the women’s 400m where double Commonwealth Games competitor Hannah Brier (Swansea Harriers) is the most experienced.
Brier is joined by Tess McHugh (Sale Harriers Manchester) who claimed the Welsh indoor title last month, Sian Harry (Belgrave Harriers) and Ffion Mair Roberts (Menai Track and Field).
Also taking to the blocks will be exciting young prospect Darcy Coslett (Llanelli AC), who has been breaking age group records and winning titles for fun in recent months.
Coslett and Harry are also entered in the 200m, where they will be joined by Cardiff Athletics clubmates Issie Tustin and Millie Webb.
In the women’s 60m, the only Welsh representative will be Jessica Mantle (Cardiff Athletics), who has made a flying start to the year, lowering her PB to 7.52.
Other sole Welsh competitors in events include Harry Bradley (Newport Harriers) in the men’s 400m, Rachel McClay-Thomas (Bracknell AC) in the women’s 800m, Sam Davies (Swansea Harriers) in the men’s high jump, Hannah Lake (Cardiff Athletics) and Carys Jones (Swansea Harriers) in the women’s pole vault.
Meanwhile, the men’s pole vault sees Mark Mellor (Cardiff Athletics) joined by Tom Walley (Wrexham AC), who won a bronze medal at last year’s championships.
Another past medallist here goes in the men’s 3,000m. Osian Perrin (Menai Track and Field) claimed silver over the same distance back in 2023.
The event is available to watch across BBC platforms.
FULL START LISTS & RESULTS (available once the event begins on Saturday morning)