DUNFERMLINE athletics star Owen Miller maintained his push for a place at the Paralympics with one of his strongest showings on the track.

The 29-year-old, a former Woodmill High School pupil, ran the second-fastest 1500 metres of his career last Tuesday (June 29) in Manchester ahead of final selections for Great Britain's athletics squad for Tokyo, which will be announced on July 21.

Fife AC athlete Miller was racing in the T20 classification, described by World Para Athletics (WPA) as an intellectual impairment, at the BMC Gold Standard Races at Stretford.

Not only was his time of three minutes and 54.52 seconds his second best of all-time, it enabled him to move into third place in the WPA world rankings within his classification.

Only Japanese athlete Daiki Akai and Russian runner Aleksandr Rabotnitskii, with times of 3:53.35 and 3:54.36 respectively, have run the distance quicker so far this year outdoors and Miller's time came after recording 3:56.24 at another BMC Gold Standard meet in Loughborough six days previously, and 3:58.79 at the Muller British Athletics 10,000m Championships, and European 10,000m Cup, in Birmingham on June 5.

Miller, who is currently ranked number one in the T20 classification in UK Para Athletics, a position he has held since 2019, ran in the BMC Gold Standard Races at Stretford last year, where he posted a time of 3:53.98, his current PB.

The Disability Sport Fife member made his debut for Great Britain in 2019 at the World Para Athletics Championships, which were held in Dubai, where he finished sixth and moved into second spot in the all-time British T20 list over 1500m.

Before lockdown last March, Miller had high hopes of making it to Tokyo, but will now be keeping his fingers crossed he makes the team.

Last year, he was one of 117 athletes who were offered places on British Athletics' 2020/21 Olympic and Paralympic World Class Programme (WCP), being granted 'Paralympic Podium Potential' status.

There are two levels of WCP membership at Paralympic level, which are Paralympic Podium and Paralympic Podium Potential, and the National Lottery-funded initiative aims to support the delivery of success at the world’s most significant sporting events, with membership based on an individual athlete’s realistic potential to win a medal at either Tokyo 2020 or Paris 2024.

Twelve track and field athletes have already been selected by Paralympics GB for the Games, which run from August 24 to September 5.