Child’s play to choose who is best this year

We were the only two to break our respective Scottish records this season

I WAS nominated for the Scottish Athlete of the Year award this week. It’s obviously a nice honour. I’ve been nominated before but I didn’t win — and I don’t expect to this year, either. This has been my best season by far. Last year I made the Olympics, but that wasn’t good enough to win the award. This year, I’ve made my first World Championships, I’ve broken the Scottish steeplechase record and I came 10th in the world, but it’s probably still not enough to win the honour. To be honest, I think there’s only one person who has gone above what I achieved this year and that was Eilidh Child. Eilidh and I had pretty similar years. She also broke the Scottish record and made the World Championship final in the 400metres hurdles, where she came fifth. I think that’s a better achievement than my 10th and I think we were the only two to break our respective Scottish records. I’m really pleased with my season, though, and the most important thing for me was the World Championships. It all bodes well for 2014. It was nice to see Chris O’Hare nominated, too. We’re the same age group and go way back to Scottish schools events; I’ve known him since I first started athletics, really. Since he has come back from the States, he’s made a real jump in progress and he’s now making senior British teams and I know how hard he trains. It’s nice because a lot of people we competed against at school have dropped out. Chris, Lynsey Sharp and I all went to the Commonwealth Youth Games together in India and that was our first big international event. We’ve also been announced in Team Scotland for the Commonwealth Games. I obviously knew I had the qualifying times but it’s nice to have it confirmed officially. It makes things a little bit easier for me. Next year, I don’t have to chase races or chase times. There’s only so many steeplechases in a year you can do, realistically, before breaking down and injuring yourself. I’ve now got that out of the way. I can concentrate on getting my flat times down and getting myself in the best physical shape possible for the Commonwealth Games. But there’s no chance of my easing off just because I’ve already qualified. I don’t want to go to Glasgow and run the slowest time I’ve ever run. Regardless of the Commonwealth Games, I want to improve every single season, I want to run a personal best and I want to get closer to the British record. In a way, it’s irrelevant what championship or race is coming up, I’ve always got something to aim for.