Dina Asher-Smith has pledged to stay off the red carpet to stay in the fast lane. The 22-year-old was named female athlete of the year at the British Athletics Writers’ Association awards on Thursday, following in the steps of Jessica Ennis-Hill, Kelly Holmes and Paula Radcliffe, but insisted she was already focused on hard training rather than invites to film premieres and awards ceremonies since entering the mainstream with her stunning performances this summer.
“I have a big obsession this year – I won’t miss training sessions, said Asher-Smith, who won the prize for her European championships treble of 100m, 200m and 4x100m gold in Berlin. “If anything clashes with training I say: ‘Sorry I can’t go.’ I get invited to do nice things because I run fast. But how do I run fast? By training.
“The Americans and Jamaicans will be there at the world championships next year, so the pressure of competition is making me work hard and train hard.”
Asher-Smith, who will miss next week’s IAAF athlete of the year awards because of training commitments, added: “Ultimately I want to just get stronger, get faster and be the best athlete I can be.”
Neil Black, the performance director of British Athletics, hailed Asher-Smith as “special” and praised her for performing when it matters. And he urged her not to change despite becoming a mainstream star. “Almost the next level of the test is: can she carry on managing as well when the interest and the requests become greater?” he said. “She has then got to protect herself from being distracted from the key focus of winning medals and the world championships.”
European 1500m gold medallist Laura Muir took second place, while Katarina Johnson-Thompson was third. Zharnel Hughes, who won 100m and 4x100m gold in Berlin and set a personal best of 9.91sec, was named Bawa male athlete of the year.
