Spar snap up British meetings for pounds 1m

Athletics

British yesterday completed its line-up of sponsors for this season's televised meetings with the announcement that Spar had signed a three-year deal worth pounds 1m.

The supermarket chain will become the title sponsor of the British Challenge - Great Britain versus an International Select team - at Crystal Palace on 17 August, one of the four key events which will be shown live on Channel 4 this summer. The British Athletic Federation's "Startrack" programmme, which encourages 25,000 children annually to participate in athletics during school holidays, will also receive the chain's backing.

The decision over the Federation's bid for an annual grant of pounds 5.5m worth of National Lottery is likely to be determined next Friday.

The UK Sports Council, which has been liaising with BAF for several months, will meet with members of the Lottery Sports Fund to finalise arrangements which are due to be announced on 12 May.

"We have restructured our financial arrangements and hopefully the matter will be sorted out soon," Matt Frazer, the BAF secretary, said. "We hve been getting the right noises from the UK Sports Council."

Meanwhile Jonathan Edwards, Britain's Olympic triple jump silver medallist and world champion, has announced his intention to compete in the Spar European Cup Final in Munich this year and the Grand Prix meeting in Bratislava.

Sally Gunnell, Britain's former world record holder in the 400m hurdles, will have her first hurdles race since she her Olympic collapse with an Achilles tendon injury on 5 June, in the Rome grand prix.

"I have just come back from three weeks hard training in South Africa and I have sorted out my stride pattern, which was causing me problems last season," she said. Gunnell added that winning gold at this summer's World Championships in Athens was a realistic aim.

"I was not sure that I ever wanted to run again after Atlanta. But as the months went by I focused on my new challenge, getting back my title.''