Teenage sprinter Tindle plans to fast-track his route to success
Youngster has already eclipsed many seniors and is the most exciting Scottish prospect for many years
E is still a schoolboy and will celebrate his 18th birthday tomorrow, yet Cameron Tindle has already eclipsed many of Scotland’s greatest senior sprinters.
A pupil at Berwick High School, he claimed the Scottish senior indoor record at 200 metres (21.14 sec) in February and will be chasing a place in Britain’s team for the World Junior Championships at the trials in Birmingham a fortnight today. The last Scottish sprinter to reach this level was Ian Mackie 22 years ago. Mackie won gold in the 4 x 100m and bronze in the 200m (20.95).
The 200m record which Tindle broke was held by multiple Scottish champion Ryan Oswald and had previously stood to European junior champion and Olympic relay silver medallist Elliot Bunney. Tindle is already 0.21 faster indoors than either Olympic semi-finalist Mackie or European outdoor champion Dougie Walker.
Tindle won Commonwealth Youth Games 100m bronze in Samoa last year with 10.42 and reached the 200m final there and at the World Youth Championships.
He is, quite simply, the most exciting Scottish sprint talent since the injuryinduced premature decline of 1986 Olympic semi-finalist Mackie.
Even US colleges, with their embarrassment of sprint riches, attempted to woo Tindle. “I had four offers,” he says, “but I had a lot of information – the pros and cons, from UK Athletics – and had already decided to go to Stirling to do sport and exercise science. So I told them thanks but no thanks.”
The regime guiding Tindle is unusual if not remarkable. He has two coaches: Henry Gray in Berwick and Bruce Scott in Earlston, both reared in the Scottish pedestrian tradition. Gray recently retired from work at Eyemouth Sports Centre. He was told of a fast kid at the high school and invited him to join his group, but rugby claimed the interest of the try-scoring winger for two years, until he tore a cartilage. It’s less than three years since he turned to athletics.
Gray, who also coaches 800m man Guy Learmonth, looks after Tindle’s fitness programme, most of which involves running alone on grass on Berwick Cricket Club’s ground at the mouth of the Tweed. At least one of Gray’s sessions each week is in the pool, usually a recovery session. The coaching duo are walking on eggshells, nursing a body yet to fully mature.
“He has hardly used blocks this year, and never does weights,” says Scott.
“We should not be stressing joints until we’re absolutely sure he has stopped growing, or performances start to plateau. The closest he comes to weights is towing a sledge, helping the drive phase of starts.”
The Stirling campus houses the Scottish Institute of Sport where Tindle is sure to have an introduction to weights.
Acknowledging that the USA and Jamaica produce many sprinters by such means, Gray agrees: “There has to be merit in using it eventually, so we’ll probably look at combining both methods sometime.”
His 20.75 is the fastest by a European junior this year. “OK, it’s wind-assisted but it’s in the legs,” says Tindle. “Your legs have to be physically capable of running that speed. So I should get the world qualifying time fairly comfortably. I hope for an individual place, but there also the relay.” GB relay coach Stephen Maguire has demanded a medal saying that it “is non-negotiable”.
At 5ft 8ins, Tindle is slight by comparison with such as Harry Aikines-Aryeetey, Dwain Chambers, and Adam Gemili, but is filling out. When he won the New Year Sprint last year he was 63kg. Now he is 10 kilos heavier.
The sledge is part of the reason. The other is the Scottish professional tradition of the speed ball, a conditioning tool used by Olympic champion Allan Wells pre-1980 and former professional sprint record holder George McNeil.
But it was also used by female swimmer Ellen King on the transatlantic trip to the first Empire Games in 1930.
Wells had a ball in the garage he converted to a gym and Tindle also uses one in the garage of Learmonth’s home, where he is supervised by Guy’s father, dental surgeon Mark.
He won Scottish junior and British universities 100 and 200m titles and trained on the speed ball with Wells under Charlie Affleck.
Tindle’s nearest track is an hour’s drive away at Tweedbank, but until exams are over and he can learn to drive, he is dependent on lifts from parents and friends.
He is there three times a week with Scott, who runs a sports therapy clinic in Earlston.
Tindle permitted himself “a few wee treats” after his New Year Sprint win yielded £4,000, “but most went within a year, on travel and accommodation coasts for my sport”.
He’d like to make a living from sport, using his degree or becoming a physiotherapist if he does not make the competitive grade.
“My dreams in the sport are always going to be more important than any money. I just try to work hard,” he said.
“I picked my course because I’m passionate about sport in general. I know there will be a lot of distractions at uni, but potentially I can make a living off something I love doing, so I will be more focused on athletics.”
He is discussing working with 400m runner Grant Plenderleith, a useful step up in training, and looking forward to two sessions a day which is difficult in Berwick.
Today he defends his 90 metres title on the grass at Earlston Border Games, but his future clearly lies elsewhere. His coaches believe him capable of 20.60 this season.
Making Britain’s world team may be harder than reaching the world final.