Sonia O'Sullivan is to make her first track appearance of the season at a pre-World Cup final meeting at the Saint Denise Stadium in Paris on June 4th. It is the second consecutive year that she has chosen to include the French meeting in her schedule, but on this occasion she is planning to compete in the 5,000 metres.

"There was a good atmosphere in the stadium last summer and now with the World Cup football finals coming up, I imagine it will be even livelier this year," she said.

"It's a meeting which normally attracts a lot of good athletes and while I've no idea what the makeup of the 5,000 metres entry will be, I imagine it will be a tough race.

"That's no bad thing for it will tell us where we're at right at the start of the season and how much needs to be done before we get to the European Championships at Budapest in August."

That O'Sullivan has chosen to start with a 5,000 metres race is highly significant. In other years she might have been tempted to open with a run over 1,500 metres or, as happened on a couple of occasions, a tough 3,000 metres.

Now, it seems as if her love affair with the metric mile may be over and while the 3,000 metres offers her an opportunity of varying her programme, it is the 5,000 metres which offers the best opportunity of championship fulfilment.

The competition for gold, silver and bronze at this distance promises to be no less intense than in the 1,500 metres championship in Budapest, but at this stage of her career she probably feels better equipped to cope with the pressures of middle-distance running.

That is not to imply that she believes she has lost the basic speed which enabled her to compete so successfully at the shorter distance and she promptly reinforced the point by announcing that she is planning an attack on the world best for two miles at the Cork City Sports on June 27th.

There is no official world record for women at this distance but the two miles is an event which has over the years produced some exceptional performances, not least at Santry on that memorable night in 1958 when Al Thomas of Australia set his world best.

O'Sullivan, who holds every national record from 800 metres through to 5,000 metres, was probably at her imperious best when running the 3,000 metres in 1995. Taking a line through her pedigree in that event, she should certainly now be capable of a big run over two miles.

After the crises of the last two years, she is radiating much of her old charisma again, courtesy of those superb wins in the World Cross Country Championships at Marrakesh in March.

That double success has restored much of the old self-belief and again established her as the athlete all others have to beat as they eye those European Championships at the end of the season.

The deep disappointment of the Atlanta Olympics and the soul-searching which followed are far too recent to permit the extravagant statement, but one senses that the athlete who was invincible on the grand prix circuit for the greater part of three years is again thinking like a champion.

"I've had my bad spell and now, thankfully, I'm out at the other end and a better athlete for it," she said. "It's been a costly but valuable learning experience and the hope is that I can benefit from it during the track season."

O'Sullivan was in Dublin yesterday to promote this season's BLOE championships which, for the third successive year, are being sponsored by Capri Son. Over 25,000 young athletes will take part in the championships throughout the summer and as a former BLOE champion, O'Sullivan didn't need any prompting when speaking of their importance on the Irish athletics calendar.

"These championships were, and are, the gateway to success for many athletes and it's good that sponsors recognise their value in the structure of the sport in Ireland," she said.

The former world sprint champion Katrin Krabbe, who was suspended for three years in 1992 for using drugs, yesterday demanded payment of at least a million marks (£340,000) from athletics' governing body. The 1991 100m and 200m world champion was suspended after a positive test for clembuterol in a training session in 1992. But the appeal court of Munich ruled yesterday the IAAF went too far in prolonging her original one-year ban by the German Federation to three years.

The former world sprint champion Katrin Krabbe, who was suspended for three years in 1992 for using drugs, yesterday demanded payment of at least a million marks (£340,000) from athletics' governing body. The 1991 100m and 200m world champion was suspended after a positive test for clembuterol in a training session in 1992. But the appeal court of Munich ruled yesterday that the IAAF went too far in prolonging her original oneyear ban by the German Federation to three years.Kenya's Daniel Komen will attempt to add the world mile to his collection of records at the Prefontaine Classic in Eugene, Oregon, on May 31st.