MATT'S A MEDAL DISTANCE SPECIALIST

Running's not the problem for this 18-year-old. After all, he boasts a personal best of 3.44 for 1500m - just six seconds outside Olympic qualifying time.

The time of day is.

"I'm not an early-morning person," he candidly admits.

"My mum has to kick me out of bed - and then make sure I'm up."

It is the last kickstart he requires all day.

By the end of it, he will have run his five miles, probably completed an interval session on the track and taken another step nearer the completion of his goal.

That goal is no less heady than to follow the fast track laid out by his idol, Sebastian Coe, whose grit and grace rivalled any athlete since the Greek courier who ran the 24 miles between Marathon and Athens in 490 BC to deliver news of a Greek victory over the Persian army.

After proclaiming the victory he collapsed and died. Coe's departure into the sunset a decade ago signalled a little death in British middle distance running too.

Peter Elliott and Tom McKean threatened briefly in the interim period but neither Elliott's Sheffield steel nor McKean's Scottish granite could cut through world athletics' elite.

Dixon has a long way to go to justify consideration for a similar - never mind more successful - assault on glory in the most solitary of sporting activities.

But he has enough pedigree to set the pulse racing.

Eight national titles in the various age categories from Under 15 might not be nearly so impressive if he had not demonstrated such a capacity to sustain his steady climb.

For this is the age of teenage proteges who suffer burnout or simply self-destruct before they are old enough to develop wise heads for their young shoulders.

Dixon, however, is sufficiently dominant in his age group to merit a European ranking of two and he heads to Slovenia on Monday regarded by many as a genuine prospect for honours in the European junior championships which run from Thursday to Sunday.

This statistic is made more powerful by the fact that if he had been born on New Year's Day 1979 and not St Stephen's Day 1978 - postponing the starting pistol by a mere six days - he would still be eligible for junior competition next season.

His induction to the senior ranks in 1998 will give him two years to adapt to the more demanding arena, two years that will be focused sharply on preparing for Sydney 2000.

And when he tells you that the games of the 27th Olympiad are a realistic target, the first step towards his goal, it is without the slightest hint of bravado or ego.

He just knows.

"The standard of British middle distance running is not that great," he said in the front room of his Great Harwood home, where medals of achievement are stuffed away in the sideboard drawer and - as you would expect from someone who wears modesty, as well as the logo of his sponsor, Asics, on his sleeve - trophies gather dust in a box underneath the stairs.

"My coach believes I can get down to 3.40 by the end of the year."

Last weekend in the world championship trials in Birmingham, John Mayock romped to victory in 3.39:69 and Matthew Yates, who finished third, didn't even breach the 3.40 barrier, further buoying Dixon's optimism.

"When I move up to the senior ranks next year I might be able to make the European indoors," he continued.

"And there may be the possibility of squeezing in the Commonwealth Games as well."

It is Dixon's desire to squeeze out the last drop of talent in his body that puts his participation in both these championships well within reach.

Of his third spot in the 800m in the English Schools Track and Field Championships at Sheffield's Don Valley Stadium at the weekend, he said: "I wasn't expected to do well, but I had my own expectations."

Clearly, the amount of work he has put into becoming an athlete of promise, he does not wish to see prove fruitless.

Initially, he displayed no great potential.

"I remember as a youngster coming 70-odd in a cross-country race at St Hubert's Primary in Harwood," he recalled.

Neither of his parents - Robert, a painter and decorator or Janet, a nurse - have any background in athletics.

Older brother Andrew has just joined the RAF as a photographer.

Pure, hard graft - the type he mustered in the final weeks before his Chemistry, Biology and Geography A-Level exams in June, the results of which he is waiting on to determine if he can enter Loughborough University to study sports science at degree level - brought Matthew through.

And it is this ethic, he believes, that spurs him on. He does not dwell on what drives him, though. Better for the sub conscious to know and the conscious to try to find out.

"I've got a talent and I believe I must exploit it," he said.

"There are so many hours you put into training that I feel you have to show something for it at the end of the day.

"If you're not training for a specific goal then it's pointless.

"That makes me so determined. I'm training for a purpose.

"That purpose is not to prove myself the number one, to prove myself to others or prove something to myself. I don't know what it is.

"But at least I have a goal."

The element of control he can exert over a field of 1500m runners is a motivating factor too.

"I feel I'm in control in a 1500m race," said Matthew, who has been offered a number of scholarships to American universities including Memphis, Tennessee and Oklahoma State.

"Over short distances I'm useless, too slow at getting off the mark.

"But if there's a sustained pace and a killing finish I can get in. It's in long races that I've done personal bests for 400!"

Personal highlights include, as head boy of Clitheroe Grammar School, meeting the Princess Royal in London to accept a certificate on behalf of the school.

"It was more nerve-wrecking than running a race," says Matthew. "I just shook her hand and did a little bow."

She did not know him. That may not always be the case.

"Matthew can go all the way," insists his Wigan Harriers coach, Chris Butler.

Provided mum gets him out of bed in time.

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