YET ANOTHER INTERNATIONAL IS BORN!

Trackspeed1 UK's glittering hall of fame expanded by yet another name yesterday (Sunday 18th) as Kieran Daly became the latest athlete to gain international honours, after 4 years in the squad.

Kieran is all smiles as the latest new international athlete produced by Trackspeed1 UK.

With 2012 and 2013 seasons littered with injury issues, Kieran had already made a bold statement with huge personal bests a week earlier at Windsor (see earlier blog), but in the annual Loughborough University international meeting he went one step further and caught the eye of England selectors.

Initially planted in the 4 x 100m relay team, he actually ended up wearing the red and white of his home country in the 200m, where he ran the second fastest time of his life - 21.13 seconds - from lane one, finishing fourth overall.

The performance that had caught the selectors' eye had been his 100m effort earlier in the day, where he took full advantage of ideal weather to clock a wind legal lifetime best of 10.37s - a far better mark than the 10.21s a week earlier, which was aided by a 5.0m/s gale behind him!

The performance ranks him currently ninth fastest in the UK this year - third fastest in his own age-group of under-23 athletes, with the great Adam Gemili only just in front with 10.32.  Chijindu Ujah leads the listings with 10.17s.  More importantly, in the race at Loughborough, Kieran finished in front of former Olympic gold medalist Mark Lewis-Francis, and former European Junior Champion David Bolarinwa.

"It was a great run," said coach John Powell who was present to watch his protégée perform, "and the great thing is that he can clearly go faster with some work on his starts.  The 200m was frustrating because he should have been slotted into lane 5, but a breakdown in communications ended up with him having to run on the inside, which almost certainly cost him a personal best, set a week ago at 21.08!"

Training partner Jason Hussain was equally delighted for Kieran.  He said on a social networking site: "Congrat's to Kieran Daly after representing England today at the Loughborough International.  I've trained with this guy for a good 5-6 years.  He has trained so hard and proper deserves the season he is having!"

Kieran will take a weekend off competition this coming weekend, but returns to action at Bedford on May 31st for the Bedford International Games. After that he will be focussing on three huge consecutive weekends: the Southern Championships, National Under-23 Championships, and finally the UK European championship trials in Birmingham.

Kieran (far side, lane 1, in red) on the final straight in the 200m at Loughborough on Sunday.

Kieran in action in the 100m at Loughborough.