Excitement Builds as the World Championships Approach - by Sonja McLaughlan

It would be fair to say I’m excited, like a kid on Christmas Eve and I’m not alone. Iwan Thomas and Katharine Merry take to twitter daily like eager children discussing their first school trip. The destination is certainly exotic, South Korea, but it’s the reason for our journey that has us all keen as mustard; The World Athletics Championships in Daegu which start on August 27th.

For the first time ever, Channel 4, will broadcast the event in the UK and along with Iwan and Katherine, I’ll be part of the team that will bring you all the action. It’s a bold move by C4, who are in the process of re-building their sports portfolio since losing test cricket in 2006, but it makes perfect sense as they build towards their coverage of the Paralympics next summer.

It’s a serious commitment to live sport and they’ve brought in some big hitters to produce the coverage. Sunset & Vine and IMG will work in partnership to show 65 hours of live athletics so that you won’t miss a thing! This is the same Sunset & Vine who won awards for their innovative coverage of cricket on C4 and brought you’ Hawk Eye’, so you can expect a fresh approach to the sport.

I’ve mentioned two of Britain’s greatest ever 400m runners in Iwan and Katharine, who are part of the #teamdaegu c4athletics team as they say on twitter. But there are other names you will have heard of too. Decathlete, Dean Macey, is also part of the C4 line-up, along with one of the sports all-time greats in Michael Johnson. John Rawling will make the hair on the back of your neck stand up when he commentates and he’ll be ably assisted by Rob Walker. Ortis Deley and Rick Edwards are the presenters who will have to keep us all in order!

All the action is live. There’s a programme to bring you the morning heats in Korea, another for all the finals and a highlights show in prime time on C4. Admittedly the time difference isn’t ideal (Daegu is 8 hours ahead) and the first programme of the day in Korea starts at around 1am in the UK, but any live session that you miss will be available you canto watch anything yagain ou miss on at athletics.channel4.com/athletics. All the live sessions are being streamed live on the web-site too which means you can watch at work if you don’t happen to be near a telly.

Personally, I can’t wait. I’ll be trackside once it all starts aiming to bring you all the colour and drama as I aim to grab a word with athletes after their races. Team GB have been set a target of 7 medals but there’s one event I can’t wait for. It’s the final of the men’s 10,000m where Mo Farah could take gold. He’s a superstar in the making and C4 will be there to record his moment on the first weekend. It could be the perfect way to start.

For more information on the upcoming World Championships check out http://athletics.channel4.com/