OLYMPIAN Jared Deacon, who won Commonwealth Games and European Championships gold medals in the Great Britain 4 x 400m relay squad last summer, will be the star attraction at the annual North-East Track and Field Championships, which is being held at Shildon's Stadium 2000 this weekend.

The 27-year-old Tynesider, who has rejoined his original club, South Shields, after spells in the National Athletics League with Morpeth and Border, will compete in four events, the 100m, 200m, 400m and 400m hurdles.

Deacon completed a hat-trick in the championships at Gateshead International Stadium last year, when, for an hour, he was Britain's fastest 400m runner, clocking a record 46.38 secs until Chris Rawlinson ran two tenths of a second quicker at an international meeting in Athens.

Deacon was also only five hundredths of a second away from the region's 400m hurdles record, when he took advantage of perfect weather conditions to record 50.68 secs - a massive three seconds better than his previous best.

Tomorrow Deacon will be defending his 200m title, when he will again be chasing the record of 21.19 secs set by his coach and elder brother, Dave, in 1994.

In the field events, another Tynesider, Paul Reid, will be defending his shot and discus titles.

The Morpeth Harrier has been a stalwart of the North-East championships over the years and has won over 50 outdoor and indoor gold medals. Today he will be chasing one of the championships' longest standing records - Arthur McKenzie's 1968 discus mark of 54.62m.

The Gosforth policeman is in fine early-season form and threw over 52 metres in a North-Eastern Athletics League meeting at Monkton Stadium last week.