Athletics - In Form Pickering Wins 60m Title

Craig Pickering beat Jason Gardener for the third time this season to win the 60m final at the European Indoor Trials and UK Championships in Sheffield.

Pickering won in 6.58 seconds with Ryan Scott second in a personal best 6.64secs while three-time European champion Gardener was seventh.

Pickering, 20, has also beaten Gardener in Glasgow and Stuttgart this year.

It was another miserable day for Mark Lewis-Francis, who did not even qualify for the final.

"I don't know what is going on," said the 24-year-old. "It would have been nice to compete in Birmingham in the European Championships but, for me, the big aim is obviously the outdoors. It's just not happening right now. I've not broken 6.70secs this season and for me that's terrible."

Pickering was delighted with his victory, which makes him one of the favourites for gold at the next month's European Championships in Birmingham.

But the European junior champion refused to write off his training partner Gardener's chances.

"I'm the best in Britain but there is a lot more to come from Jason Gardener yet," said Pickering. "No-one can write him off. He has been in this position before and come back and won the European Indoors. I'm just pleased with how I am competing, I'm running well."

Laura Turner won the women's 60m in a personal best of 7.25, one-hundredth of a second ahead of Jeanette Kwakye, with both inside the qualification standard for Birmingham.

Mo Farah claimed an emphatic victory in the 3,000m, winning in seven minutes 50.86 seconds ahead of Nick McCormick.

Teenager James Brewer timed his run perfectly to pip Richard Hill in the final moments of the 800m and win in 1:49.03.

Amy Harris won the long jump with a leap of 6.47m with Commonwealth heptathlon bronze medallist Jessica Ennis - competing in her fourth event of the weekend - in third.

Nicola Sanders ran an impressive 50.60secs in the 400m to finish almost three seconds ahead of her nearest rival.

The duel between European silver medallist Nathan Douglas and Commonwealth champion Phillips Idowu in the triple jump failed to materialise after the latter withdrew as a precautionary measure following an injury to his right heel.

However, the 28-year-old's sole effort of 16.68m was sufficient to claim second behind Douglas, who produced a personal best of 17.19m with his one legal jump.