21 January 2010

The 2004 200m Olympic Champion Shawn Crawford is preparing to make his Aviva International Match debut at the Kelvin Hall as part of Team USA.

Crawford, Olympic Gold medallist at the Athens Olympics and Silver medallist in Beijing 2008, will be adding his weight to the already strong USA team, captained by reigning World Indoor-champion hurdler Lolo Jones. He has an impressive best for 200m of 20.26 – the fourth fastest ever indoors – and he may challenge the stadium record of 20.67 set by John Regis 15 years ago.

Crawford won the World Indoor title in 2001 but hasn’t been a regular on the indoor circuit since. Never the less he will be looking to dominate the race.

He said: “I’m excited to be running for the USA at the Aviva International Match.  We don’t often get to compete as a team, but when we do it’s always a great event.

“We’ve got a really strong American contingent coming over to Glasgow at the end of the month and I’m sure most of the guys will be hoping that a good start to the season will help them out in Doha at the World Indoor Championships.

“It will be a good opportunity to try out the new false start rule.  The more we get to race under those conditions the easier it will be to get used to, but ultimately it will be the same for everyone who lines up at the beginning of a race.

“Lolo (Jones) will undoubtedly be hungry to captain us to victory and I know we’ll all want to be on that podium at the end of the event too.”

Olympic bronze medallist David Oliver and US champion sprinter Carmelita Jeter are also competing as part of Team USA who will be aiming to regain the team trophy they last won in 2007.

Crawford will be competing against Olympian Brendan Christian, who is running as part of the Commonwealth Team, with the other team’s competitors still to be selected.

Tickets for the Aviva International Match at the Kelvin Hall, Glasgow on Saturday 30th January are available by phone on 08000 556 056 or online at www.uka.org.uk