Wirral Olympian Andy Baddeley defends 4km title at the BUPA Great Edinburgh Cross Country event

Jan 14 2009 by Philip Kirkbride, Birkenhead News

WIRRAL Olympian Andy Baddeley defended his 4km title in convincing style at the BUPA Great Edinburgh Cross Country event on Saturday.

The 26-year-old Great Britain athlete, fully fit after an Achilles injury, shook off the challenge of Steve Vernon and Tom Lancashire to reclaim his crown.

Baddeley, pictured, also had to overcome being spiked by training partner Mike Skinner just before the bell but accelerated from the chasing pack with 1km to go.

The Beijing 1,500m finalist, who is to race in New York before travelling for winter training in Australia under Nic Bideau, said of his spiked ankle: “It looked worse than it was”.

Completing the Holyrood Park course in 12 minutes 17 seconds, beating his 2008 time of 12 minutes 52 seconds, the victory has provided Baddeley with the perfect start in his preparations for the World Athletics Championships in Berlin this August.

Baddeley, who has a cardiac monitoring device in his chest because of an irregular heartbeat, will race indoors in the United States before heading Down Under, where he will takes on Olympic bronze medallist Nick Willis in an invitational mile in Christchurch, New Zealand.

The Cambridge University graduate scored victory in the Dream Mile in Oslo last year, the first Briton to do so since Peter Elliott in 1991, recording the third-fastest time of the past three years but finished ninth in a disappointing Olympic 1500m final.

Married in October, Andy says he has delayed plans to remove the ECG (electrocardiogram) device in his chest until after the World Championships and delivered a statement of intent following his Beijing final heartache. He said: “I'm 26 now and know what I'm capable of. Medals are the aim from now on.”