Britain’s men’s sprint relay teams are set to take on the world, in one of the biggest 4x100m relay races of the year, at the Müller Anniversary Games, in the London Stadium on 20–21 July.

Two Great Britain & Northern Ireland 4x100m quartets will line up against Australia, China, Chinese Taipei, Germany, Japan, Netherlands and Poland for an exciting showdown, which is sure to set the stadium alight.

Great Britain’s men’s sprint relay teams have returned to top form with some exceptional performances in recent years. In 2017, they produced an unforgettable display to win gold at the IAAF World Championships in London, and they have also won the 4x100m at the last three European Championships.

European 100m and 4x100m relay champion Zharnel Hughes has established himself as one of Britain’s leading relay runners and will be aiming for selection for the Müller Anniversary Games and beyond.

He believes the 4x100m will be one of the most exciting events of the weekend at the Diamond League meet, which takes place just ten weeks before the start of the IAAF World Championships in Doha.

Hughes said: “The men’s sprint relay at the Müller Anniversary Games is going to be a huge race. We’ll have two GB men’s relay teams battling each other for supremacy and taking on some of the best sprint quartets in the world. So, the fans can expect some fireworks in the London Stadium.

“The 4x100m relay is a really special event for the GB sprinters and it’s a privilege for me to be part of this exciting, current quartet. Racing as part of team that’s perfectly in sync, is a truly magical feeling.

“The crowd always goes wild when the relay is on, and the noise in the London Stadium when Great Britain won gold there two years ago was unbelievable. I hope lots of fans will come and cheer the Brits on again this year, at the Müller Anniversary Games.”

The Müller Anniversary Games has seen history made on numerous occasions in recent years, with some memorable performances from British names such as Sir Mo Farah, Laura Muir and Dina Asher-Smith, while para athletics stars Kare Adenegan and Sophie Hahn both broke world records at the 2018 edition of the event.

In the bustling surroundings of Birmingham Airport, dancers from the Freefall Dance Company, one of Birmingham Royal Ballet’s most long-standing and impactful programmes, strutted their stuff as the year long partnership with Birmingham Airport was launched.

At All Bar One, in Birmingham Airport, Paul James, Chief Commercial Officer for the Birmingham Royal Ballet opened, “There were two things that struck me one which was making ballet more accessible for all and the other was changing lives for others. “This partnership is to promote and help those with learning difficulties and to support them in their love of ballet.”

The Airport is donating to Birmingham Royal Ballet to support Freefall, their second company that works with young adults with severe learning disabilities. The event included the premiere of a new film featuring the Freefall dancers, directed by Birmingham Royal Ballet Director David Bintley with Ross MacGibbon.

“We look forward to joining you for the remainder of the year while this runs on,” explained Birmingham Airport chief executive, Nick Barton, “and we’ll see the success and the talent of these young people who have got real challenges but show great merit and great talent to overcome them”.

Leading up to the live performance a couple of the parents of the Freefall dancers beamed “he comes home and tells me how much he loves it every time.” The performance started off with three dancers by the end there were thirteen young adults expressing their passion for dance. The performance was very enjoyable to watch and at the end one dancer was extremely proud of the show.

His happiness was infectious, and really made you realise how much these dancers loved putting on the show. Freefall Dance Company is comprised of 10 adults with severe learning disabilities (SLD) and has been creating and performing daring, ground-breaking and award-winning dance since 2002.

By combining the dancers’ exceptional talents and individual styles, Freefall has repeatedly challenged and amazed audiences locally, nationally and internationally proving their artistic potential.

Dance Track is BRB’s talent identification programme within Birmingham schools, aimed at training young dancers aged from six to eight. Every year Dance Track invites 80 children who demonstrate a talent for dance to join the programme.

The participants, who might not otherwise have an opportunity to participate in dance, are given free weekly ballet lessons taught by Birmingham Royal Ballet staff. Throughout the year, they are invited to Birmingham Royal Ballet to have a look behind the scenes, meet Company dancers and are offered tickets to see Birmingham Royal Ballet performances at Birmingham Hippodrome.

Through this new partnership, Birmingham Airport will provide funding to enable one new school in the North East area of Birmingham to join the Dance Track programme, giving more children in the city access to the world of dance.

As part of its three years to go celebrations, the team behind Birmingham 2022 is dialling up the countdown to the Commonwealth Games by rolling out an art-led community research project that aims to connect communities across the West Midlands.

Birmingham 2022 is staging an innovative research project called Common Ground, which will visit nine locations across the region throughout June and July, inviting people to have a conversation about the Games and to explore how Birmingham 2022 can benefit their community and create a legacy in the region.

Featuring local artist illustrators Room 0121 and Void One who will be joined by a team of researchers, Common Ground hopes to engage local people to explore how they feel the Games can bring people together and provide a catalyst for change to benefit them and others living in their local area. The findings will be used by the artists to create a visual interpretation of the conversations, as they happen, at each location.

Common Ground will conclude with an exciting Birmingham 2022 milestone, an event called Commonwealth Social taking in Birmingham city centre on Saturday 27 July. The Commonwealth Social will mark the momentous milestone of three years to gountil the Opening Ceremony of the Commonwealth Games in 2022 by uniting the people of the city and the region, who are pivotal in helping to shape Birmingham’s inaugural Games. The Commonwealth Social will also reveal the new Birmingham 2022 brand identity, which has been co-created with local communities across the West Midlands to truly reflect the region.

Common Ground will take place in the following locations on the dates below:

Saturday 22 June        Cannock                     Cannock Shopping Centre

Saturday 6 July           Coventry                     Broadgate

Sunday 7 July             Wolverhampton          Wolverhampton Food & Drink Festival

Friday 12 July             Stourbridge                 Ryemarket Shopping Centre

Saturday 13 July         West Brom                  Sandwell Arts Café, New Square

Sunday 14 July           Sutton Coldfield          Community Games - Wyndley Leisure Centre

Wednesday 17 July    Solihull                        Touchwood Shopping Centre

Saturday 20 July         Walsall                         Saddlers Shopping Centre

Saturday 27 July         Birmingham                City Centre – Centenary Square

Josie Stevens, Chief Marketing and Communications Officer for Birmingham 2022, said: “We’re putting local people at the heart of the Games and celebrating what makes the region special. For us to do this effectively it’s important that we hear from local communities and give them a voice to share their ideas, which in turn will help shape our approach. We want to create a Commonwealth Games that unites the region, benefits local people and marks the occasion in a way that only Birmingham can.”

The Birmingham 2022 Commonwealth Games is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity that will bring athletes, officials, spectators and local people together in a unique celebration of sport, culture and business, creating growth and positive change in Birmingham and wider the West Midlands.

Commonwealth heptathlon champion Katarina Johnson-Thompson will compete on both days at the Müller Anniversary Games, in the London Stadium on 20–21 July.

The multi-events star will line up in the 200m on day one, followed by the long jump on day two, exactly ten weeks before the start of the IAAF World Championships in Doha.

Johnson-Thompson has, so far this year, continued to produce the good form and confidence she found in 2018, a pivotal year in which she won the World Indoor pentathlon title, followed by her first major senior heptathlon medals; gold at the Commonwealth Games in Australia and silver at the European Championships in Berlin.

In March this year, the Liverpool athlete won her second European Indoor pentathlon title in Glasgow. She then produced an exceptional performance in Austria last month, to win the heptathlon at the Gotzis Hypo-Meeting, with a personal best and world-leading score of 6,813 points. This beat her previous best score of 6,759, set in Berlin on her way to winning the European silver medal last year.

Johnson-Thompson will be hoping for a quick time over 200m where she will line up against some of the fastest women in the world. She’ll also be looking for a big distance in the long jump, one of her strongest disciplines and an event in which she won a World Indoor silver medal in 2014.

Johnson Thompson said: “I’m really looking forward to competing on both days at the Müller Anniversary Games this year. I love this meet and the London Stadium is such an amazing venue, there’s no place like it in the world.

“With just ten weeks to go until the world championships, all the best athletes will be competing with an eye on being in the best shape for Doha. I’ll be doing the same, trying to put together what I’d be working on in training to produce good performances on both days.”

She continued: “I’m really settled now, in France, and the improvement in my performances have reflected that. My coach and training group are great and working with them has definitely given me more confidence.”

The Müller Anniversary Games has seen history made on numerous occasions in recent years, with some memorable performances from British names such as Sir Mo Farah, Laura Muir and Dina Asher-Smith, while para athletics stars Kare Adenegan and Sophie Hahn both broke world records at the 2018 edition of the event.  

Described as a 'champion in the making', teenage sensation Cori 'Coco' Gauff, who at 15 years and 122 days became the youngest player to qualify for the main Wimbledon draw since the Open era began in 1968, swept aside five-time winning legend of the game, Venus Williams 6-4 6-4 on Court One in front of a packed crowd.

Comes from sporting stock - she is coached by her father Corey, who played basketball at Georgia State University and her mother Candi was a gymnast before moving into track and field – the tournaments new sensation adds this new record to that of her becoming the youngest US Open girls singles finalist at the aged just 13.

She won the French Open equivalent last year, aged 14.

BBC's Today at Wimbledon two-time US Open champion Tracy Austin said: "People have been talking about Coco for years”.

"They have now started to recognise her internationally. Obviously she's a tremendous athlete, but to walk on court to face Venus, a player who she idolises, there were plenty of opportunities for her to get tight and nervous.

"She has been raised for greatness and this is just the beginning".

Three-time Wimbledon singles champion John McEnroe said: "Gauff's not only physically mature, but also mentally.

The 7-times Grand Slam winner adding: "I look at the way she plays. If she's not number one in world by 20 I will be absolutely shocked."

Atlanta, Georgia-born Gauff idolised Venus and Serena Williams sisters, so being drawn against the elder of the two in the first round, was a dream-come-true.

To beat the seven-times ‘Slam winner was beyond belief for her.

British Athletics has selected a team of 15 for the World Para Athletics Junior Championships which take place in Nottwil, Switzerland from 1-4 August 2019.

Among those set to represent the country are two medallists from the 2017 edition of these championships, Karim Chan and Ethan Kirby, with 11 athletes earning their first junior international cap for the Great Britain & Northern Ireland team.

Chan won the T20 long jump title – for athletes with an intellectual impairment - in Nottwil two years ago and earns his place in the 2019 squad following a season so far which has seen him extend his personal best by 13cm to 6.33m.

Kirby won silver back in 2017 in the T20 400m and will compete over the distance once more in Nottwil. He lowered his PB to 52.92 at the end of May, dipping under 53 seconds for the first time. He will be joined in the T20 400m by Prince Reid who has a best of 52.49s, set in Watford last month. The athletes come into the under 20 contest as two of the leading names in the season’s rankings.

In the women’s T20 400m, Faye Olszowka will make her British debut in the U20 age-group, heading into the event ranked second in the junior world standings after revising her lifetime best to 1:03.08 in May.

Matthew Cooper, ranked second in the world in the junior T34 rankings in 2019, will be one to watch out for when he goes in the combined U20 T33/34 100m in August. The Weir Archer Academy athlete will additionally contest the 200m and 400m in Switzerland, as will Zien Zhou who also contests all three distances.

Ben Callander – a T33 athlete who is ranked number one junior in the world in the classification – will join the pair in the T33/34 100m, 200m and 400m.

One athlete has been selected in the U17 category; Wales-based Molly Hopkins who will race in the T62 100m – for athletes with lower limb amputations competing with a prosthetic – in her first international competition.

Team Leader Sarah Benson commented: “We are delighted to select 15 athletes for the second World Para Athletics Junior Championships. This event serves as an important step for these athletes in the Paralympic performance pathway and will be a fantastic opportunity to experience the international competition environment.

“It will be a great learning experience for these exciting prospects and I’m sure it will help them in preparation for future potential Paralympic Games and senior world championships.”