How inspiring to see last year's Local Heroes Awards winner, Laura Whitfield finally meet her mentor, Olympic swimmer Mark Foster.

As part of her prize Laura had the opportunity to receive expert coaching from Mark, one of the UK's best known swimmers. Laura is hoping to secure a place in the national squad for the Paralympic Games this year although the Games in Beijing in 2008 seem to be a more realistic target for a very remarkable young lady who embodies the spirit of Local Heroes.

Good luck to Bishop Auckland's Guy Wilks who will be competing in the Pirelli International Rally this weekend, along with co-driver Phil Pugh. Now driving for the Suzuki dealer team Guy, the up and coming British driver, will be in the North-East today and tomorrow for the stages taking place in and around Kielder Forest. Hopefully local motorsport fans will turn out to cheer him on.

Among the contenders for team of the year must be Middlesbrough's triumphant youth team. A stunning 4-0 aggregate victory over Aston Villa in the Youth Cup final culminated in Middlesbrough's second piece of major silverware of the season. Just like buses, you wait for 128 years for one to come along and then two come together!

Seriously though, it bodes well for the club's future that its youth system is so successful and the most impressive thing of all is that ten of the eleven who played in the final are local lads who have been with the club for a long time, many since they were ten years old. Let's hope some of these talented young players graduate through to the Premier League in the next few seasons.

Must mention the sad loss of a true local hero, the great George Hardwick, who passed away this week. 'Gentleman' George played 166 times for Middlesbrough and captained his home town club, his country and on one special occasion, Great Britain.

Commemorated with a statue outside the Riverside Stadium, it was a fitting tribute to a footballing legend that the club he supported all his life should win its first ever trophy this year.

Don't forget to join me and the rest of the team this Saturday on 96.6tfm as Boro entertain Aston Villa at the Riverside, Hartlepool travel to Rushden & Diamonds with the play-offs firmly in their sights and Darlington visit high-flying Lincoln City. The fun starts with Ditchy, myself and Terry Cochrane at noon then we get down to the serious business live from all the local games from 2pm. Finally, call Tom Davies to chew over the day's games from 5pm.