Young Mid-Island Island Striders star Whitney Matthew has qualified for the Pennsylvania state indoor high school track championships to be held this weekend.

The Mercersburg Academy and former Berkeley Institute student ran a personal best time of 25.5 seconds in the 200 metres at the Penn State University track last week ? a time which qualified her to compete in the championships and gave her a ranking of fifth in the state.

The 17-year-old Matthew ? who is in her second year of an academic and athletics scholarship at the prestigious US prep school ? also qualified for the 400 metres after registering a time of 58.8 seconds last week ? the seventh best effort in Pennsylvania this year.

Matthew is the current Under-17 national champion in both the 100 and 200 metres.

?We?re all very proud of her,? said Striders coach Bill Euler. ?We?ve been working with Whitney since she was nine years-old and there was never any doubt that she was supremely talented. Not only is she a very gifted athlete, she is also a very intelligent young lady as well, which is why she managed to secure a $24,000 academic and athletic scholarship.

?Since she?s been at Mercerberg, she?s been training five days a week and racing at weekends and her times have been getting better and better. We?re really looking forward to seeing how she does this weekend.?

Today?s 12th annual Telford Electric Magic Mile has attracted just under 700 entries, organiser Cal Simons revealed yesterday.

All registered runners are asked to go to Devonshire Recreation Club between 8.30 and 11.00 this morning to pick up their race numbers while Simons also urged those taking part to arrive half an hour ahead of their scheduled race time.