PITREAVIE AAC star Rebecca Grieve is a European champion after she bagged a gold medal at a continental competition.

The 17-year-old, ranked number one in Scotland for her age group over 400 and 200 metres, has been in Israel with Great Britain and Northern Ireland at the European Athletics Under-18 Championships.

Rebecca, one of seven Scots picked in the 40-strong squad, was selected to run in the women's medley relay race, and, alongside Jessica Astill, Emmanuella Quaye and Nia Wedderburn-Goodison, progressed to the final.

A strong performance in Wednesday's heats, which saw them post the quickest time of any qualifier (2:07.66), put them into the race for the medals, which took place yesterday evening.

The GB quartet were up against Finland, Slovenia, Romania, Poland, Spain, Czech Republic and Italy, and secured a glittering gold in dramatic fashion.

Rebecca was joined in the final by Renee Regis, a 100m bronze medallist, and 200m champion, Faith Akinbileje, who got the team off to a fine start over the opening 100m and 200m legs, before the baton was handed over to the Pitreavie athlete for the 300m leg.

When she handed over to Etty Sisson at the final changeover, GB were in second position behind Italy, but the British runner, who finished fourth in the individual 400m final, sat on her rival's shoulder until the closing stages before taking the win on the line.

The GB team's winning time of 2:07.18 was a new record for the championships, and a European under-18 best performance.

Before flying out to Jerusalem, Rebecca told Press Sport that she would "put everything I can into that relay and hopefully try and get us on the podium", while her coach, Francis Smith, added that he thought they had a "great chance in the medley relay, and hopefully she can bring a medal back".

Posting on social media after her success, he posted: "So proud of Rebecca and her team mates gold in the relay amazing!"

Pitreavie AAC said they were "super proud" of Rebecca and her team-mates' performance, while Scottish Athletics also offered their congratulations.

We will have more on Rebecca's success in next week's Press Sport.