5 December 2008

Athletics’ 2012 hopeful Greg Rutherford has confirmed he will be kicking off his 2009 indoor season at the UKA major events in Glasgow, Sheffield and Birmingham.

Rutherford has made himself available for the Aviva International match in Glasgow on January 31 and plans to compete at the Aviva Grand Prix in Birmingham on February 21 and the Aviva European trials and UK Championships in Sheffield on the weekend of February 14 & 15 as Britain’s best attempt to qualify for the European indoor championships in March.

And Rutherford says he will be coming out all guns blazing after missing out on a long jump medal at the Beijing Olympics, despite going into the final with the third best qualifying jump.

He has now revealed that his Beijing campaign was badly affected by illness, although he refused to use that as an excuse.

Rutherford said: “My qualifying jump in the first round out there went incredibly well. I opened with 8.16m, the biggest jump I have ever opened with and I was thinking back to 2006 when I won a European medal.

“If I could just carry on in this manner maybe I could win a medal two days later.

“What wasn’t known or publicised at the time was I was ill during my time out there and I was rushed to hospital the day after my final. I had multiple infections around my body but at the time it wasn’t a good idea to let that be known because it would have just looked like excuses.

“I am still gutted because the way I was jumping I was on line for a medal, I could have been an Olympic champion – the positives I can take from the whole experience was that I qualified for my first Olympic final well, really well.

“It gives me great confidence looking forward to 2009.”

Tickets for all three indoor events are now available by phone on 08000 556 056 or online at www.ukathletics.net