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SPRINTER Tyrone Edgar insists he will have to return from next year’s European Championships with a medal to declare or risk getting left in the cold by the time the Olympics reach London.

Edgar endured mixed fortunes at the World Championships this summer, helping Team GB to bronze in the sprint relay just days after he was disqualified in the 100m semi-final for a false start.

The 27-year-old had set his sights on reaching a first major championship final in Berlin, but suffered heartache in the Olympiastadion as he exited the competition at the same stage as he did during the Beijing Olympics.

But with another major championship under his belt, Edgar is adamant he will need to take his career to the next level in 2010 – starting with a final berth during the Europeans in Barcelona.

“As an individual I didn’t fulfil my dream of making it to the world finals this season and that hurt,” said Edgar, speaking at the Aviva School Sport Matters Awards.

“My dream now and my focus is making it to a global final because when you get to a final anything can happen.

“I’m looking at the Europeans and I’m saying I have to come away from there with a medal for it to be any kind of success for me.

“I’ve been to the semi-finals of major champs twice now and I know how that feels, now I have to go beyond that and I have to start getting to finals and winning medals.

“There are plenty of boys like Harry Aikines-Aryeetey and Simeon Williamson behind me now and I’m not a youth, I know it’s time to step up and at the Europeans there can be no excuses.”

Edgar knows first hand how good the next wave of British sprinters are having teamed up with Aikines-Aryeetey and Williamson to land bronze, behind Usain Bolt’s Jamaica and Trinidad and Tobago in the German capital.

And with veteran and former Olympic relay champion Marlon Devonish completing the set, Edgar believes the quartet have the ability to turn bronze in to gold when the Olympics arrive in London.

“We’re smoother than Jamaica and the USA and I think our mental attitude towards the relay is better than theirs as well,” he added.

“Now what we need to do is get our speed up, if we get our speed up there will be no stopping us.

“I am so looking forward to next year with Marlon and as young as Harry is and as young as Simeon is, and I’m only 27 we’re looking great, so looking at 2012 and the run up to that we’re only going to get better, we’re only going to get faster.

“We’re already one of the slickest teams out there so we just need to put a little more speed into it and I guarantee you we will be competing for gold.”

The Aviva and Daily Telegraph School Sport Matters Awards recognise outstanding achievements in school sport across the country, and are part of Aviva’s wider commitment to give every child in the country the opportunity to get involved in athletics by 2012. For more information go to aviva.co.uk/athletics

Published: 19 October 2009
Issue: 1394

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