Australian race walkers train at Leeds Met

Elite athletes from the Australian track & field team have been training at Leeds Metropolitan as part of their training programme.

Jess Rothwell and Cheryl Webb have been spending time training alongside athletes from the UK Athletics National Race Walking Centre who are based at the University's Headingley Campus under the tutelage of Dr Andi Drake.

Jess was fourth in the World Junior Championships in 2008 whilst Cheryl was part of the Australia's 2004 Olympics team which competed in Athens.  Both athletes competed in the World Championships 20km in Berlin last year and recently competed in Mexico at the IAAF Race Walking World Cup alongside Leeds Met athlete Jo Jackson.

Speaking about their experiences of Leeds Jess commented: "It's been really good, there are fantastic facilities here at the University, the track is really close and the accommodation is excellent and it's been brilliant to train alongside the UK race walkers."

Carnegie Director of Race Walking Dr Andi Drake said: "Both of the girls are world class performers so that calibre of athletes has really inspired and challenged our athletes in training and improved the quality of the sessions as it's great to have excellence around."