‘Local’ girl making great strides

She may have been raised and is living in Malaysia, but 14-year-old Lauren Purchase has come onto the Welsh sporting radar with some stunning performances in Asia.

The youngster (pictured, middle) is already a part of the Welsh U17 and U15 football set-ups after attending training camps earlier this year, but it is her athletics performances which are also catching the eye.

Lauren is the daughter of former Llanfair Caereinion and Welshpool High school students Dacre Purchase and Caroline Morris who are living in Kuala Lumpur.

She recently competed in an U18 International Schools athletics competition against athletes from Singapore, Thailand and Malaysia and clinched a handful of medals. She took part in the 100m, 4x100m relay, 400m and 4x400m relay, picking up gold, gold, silver and bronze respectively. Her meet record in the 100m of 12.86 seconds places her in the Wales top three based on 2018 times in her age category.

Lauren is a student of the Alice Smith British International School in Kuala Lumpur and also plays in the boys U16 Air Asia Leaque for her club KLYS, as well as the U15 Wales girls team.