Weir has sights set on Beijing gold

After the exertions of this year’s London Marathon, David Weir told Disability Now he is firmly focusing on his first Paralympic gold medal.

Along with Shelly Woods, Weir will head to Portugal for a training camp, before returning home to Manchester next month at the Paralympic World Cup.

Weir was keeping his choice of events for Beijing close to his chest, but confirmed he would again race over 400 and 1500m in Manchester.

The four-time London Marathon winner was out of action for several months at the end of last year with glandular fever, and missed the World Championships in Osaka where he was due to compete in an exhibition 1500m.

He said: “Touch wood, the glandular fever has gone. I’m doing all the right things like vitamins, nutritionists, but it’s just when I catch little colds and coughs they seem to linger for a long time and they run me down.“

Despite the setback, he had ominous words for his rivals. “I’m not even up to my full training at the moment. Where I was training twice a day, six days a week, I was really super fit. But now I’m just doing a couple of hours a day. I’m doing the quality, just not the quantity, but sometimes it does you good just to do the quality.”

Weir, who won a bronze and a silver in Athens, said he hoped to go one better in Beijing and bring back a gold.

“I’ve not won a Paralympic gold so my aim is to come home with one. My aim is to come back with just one gold and anything else is just an added bonus.”