Courageous Griffin to the fore

Solid front-running by Andy Griffin paid off in yesterday's Compaq four-kilometre race when he clinched second place behind Italy's Gennaro di Napoli.

Griffin, who led through the first kilometre in 2min 50sec, finished a second behind Di Napoli, the five-times European Cup 5,000m gold medallist, who won in 10min 58sec. Tony Whiteman, of Shaftesbury Barnet, was third, with John Mayock fourth.

Griffin, 22, from Tonbridge, produced his best performance at senior level and said: "I didn't know how things would go because I've been struggling in training during the last week. But I was up with leaders early on and when I stayed there until the halfway mark I just dug in."

Ireland's Sonia O'Sullivan narrowly missed the world five-mile record when winning the women's international road race. O'Sullivan, who set the previous best time for the distance of 24:27 in Ireland last October only to have it disallowed as the course was downhill, was a runaway and lonely winner in 24:50.

Second place went to London Marathon winner Tegla Loroupe with another Kenyan, Joyce Chepchumba, in third. Chepchumba recovered from being well behind after her shoelace came undone.