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Glasgow 2026 Commonwealth Games - Preview
23/07/2026 00:00, In Blog / Glasgow 2026 Commonwealth Games - Latest News /
Before a single competitor steps onto the track or into the throwing circle at Glasgow’s Scotstoun Stadium, the stories behind the athletes which make up Team Wales’ track and field selection are sure to provide an inspirational legacy for generations to come.
“People Make Glasgow” has become a familiar slogan around the Commonwealth Games host city over the past decade or more.
The same can be said for the Welsh track and field team.
There are Olympians and Paralympians making dramatic returns to the Games after career-saving surgeries.
A winter Olympian making the transition back to her summer sport and a 17-year-old making her senior international debut at one of the biggest multi-sports events on the planet.
These are just some of the human interest tales to tell before a starting pistol has been fired or a run-up cone removed.
The 18-strong squad will represent Wales over six days of competition when the athletics action gets underway on July 27.
Team Wales will be led by one of the most popular and inspirational athletes the country has produced in recent times – Olivia Breen.
The City of Portsmouth athlete’s huge and infectious smile was beamed around the world four years ago at the Birmingham games as she clinched the 100m title.
Fittingly, Breen is amongst the first of the Welsh athletics team to compete in the sport’s opening session of the Games on the morning of July 27 when she returns to defend her T37/38 100m title.
The 2018 long jump gold medallist has been building nicely towards the games despite suffering a concussion after falling in training.
Last weekend Breen ran a season’s best 13.01 in the ambulant women’s 100m at the Novuna London Athletics Meeting.
The first morning’s action will see another Welsh speedster in action as Jeremiah Azu (Cardiff Athletics) takes to the blocks in the first round of the men’s 100m.
A lot has happened on and off the track since Azu finished fifth in the Commonwealth Games final in Birmingham four years ago.
The Welsh 100m record holder won an individual 100m bronze and 4x100 gold for Great Britain at the European Championships shortly afterwards. In 2024 he represented Great Britain again at the Paris Olympics where he won a 4x100m relay bronze medal.
But Azu topped the lot last year when he became a dad for the first time and won the UK, European and the World 60m titles all in the matter of a few weeks.
The 25-year-old also tuned up for the Commonwealths at last week’s London meeting where he ran 10.07.
The third Welsh athlete in action on Monday morning is hammer thrower Amber Simpson (Wrexham AC), who will be looking to book her place in Tuesday evening’s final.
Like Breen and Azu, Simpson will feel at home in the red vest having represented Wales at the Birmingham Games where she finished a highly creditable fifth place thanks to a new personal best.
Following a hugely successful college career in the US, Simpson now lives across the pond where she set a new Welsh hammer record of 70.21m in 2024. Simpson’s best this season is 66.75m which she threw in March.
Monday’s evening session, sees the Welsh team’s youngest member Ellie Bowen (Cardiff Archers) make her senior bow for Wales in the women’s F55-57 seated shot put final.
Bowen took up athletics in 2018 after attending a disability sport open day in Cardiff. When athletics returned after the Covid pandemic, the teenager’s talent blossomed, winning a string of competitions and travelling to Dubai where she secured her international classification.
Earlier this summer, Bowen celebrated a new personal best of 6.20m at the Welsh Senior Track and Field Championships in Cardiff.
On the track, Issy Boffey (Enfield and Haringey AC) will be lining up in the first round heats of the women’s 800m.
Since transferring her allegiance from England to Wales, thanks to her Porthcawl-born mum) last year, Boffey has experienced a transformation in her performances.
In 2023 she dipped under the two minute barrier for the first time, but had been unable to do so again until last year as she suffered a number of setbacks including pulling her hamstring weeks before the 2024 Olympic trials.
But in August 2025 Boffey once again went below two minutes as she clocked 1:59.53 in Belgium and has since lowered her PB to 1:57.43, which she ran indoors in January of this year to claim the Welsh indoor record.
Last weekend, Boffey ran an outdoor season’s best as she clocked 1:58.85 to finish sixth in the 800m behind Olympic Champion Keely Hodgkinson in London.
Hopefully, Breen will also be in action in the women’s T37/38 Final on Monday night.
Tuesday’s morning’s action sees the start of Abi Pawlett’s heptathlon campaign. Trafford AC multi-eventer opens her account with what is potentially one of her most profitable events - the 100m hurdles.
Despite suffering from a serious bone infection as a child and a number of injury setbacks in recent years, Pawlett has become one of the UK’s top heptathletes, winning a silver medal at the European Under-23 Championships in Norway last year.
Pawlett is the Welsh heptathlon record holder and earlier this year posted a new indoor pentathlon personal best finishing second in the Orlen Copernicus Cup in Poland. The morning will also see her tackle the high jump.
One of Wales’ most in-form athletes will also be in action during the morning session as Charlotte Henrich (Invicta East Kent) takes to the blocks in the first round of the women’s 400m.
In the past month, Henrich has twice improved the Welsh 400m record, which had been held by Michelle Scutt for more than 44 years.
Firstly, Britian’s fastest teenager over 400m broke Scutt’s record as she claimed bronze at the Novuna UK Championships, then she bettered her own record by running 50.45 in the Diamond League in London.
Another athlete who was in action in the capital will be competing in the men’s 800m first round on Tuesday morning.
Justin Davies (Team Bath) prepared for Glasgow by finishing third in a non-Diamond League domestic 800m race in a season’s best time of 1:45.99. Last summer Davies won a silver medal at the European Under-23 Championships in Norway and set a new Welsh record of 1:44.35 in Belfast.
What promises to be a busy morning for Welsh supporters in the stadium is also due to feature the return of Winter Olympian Adele Nicoll (Birchfield Harriers) in the women’s shot put qualification.
In February of this year, Nicoll was hurtling down the ice at the Cortina Sliding Centre in Italy’s southern Dolomitic Alps at speeds well in excess of 70mph, representing Great Britain in bobsleigh at the Winter Olympics.
In Glasgow, the three-time UK shot put champion, is setting her sights on improving the eighth place she achieved at the Birmingham games four years ago. Despite suffering an elbow injury in recent weeks, Nicoll recently defended her Welsh title in Cardiff.
Tuesday’s evening session will hopefully see Jeremiah Azu back on the track as the timetable features the men’s 100m semi-finals and final, while Amber Simpson may also feature in the hammer final.
Abi Pawlett will be back looking to continue her progress in the heptathlon’s shot put and 200m.
Wednesday morning will welcome the appearance of the man whose return to action is already one of the most remarkable stories of this year’s event.
Four years ago Jake Heyward (Cardiff Athletics) set a new Welsh record as he finished fifth in the 1500m final in Birmingham. Twelve days later, the Tokyo Olympian won a silver medal at the European Athletics Championships.
However, Heyward’s appearance at the Lausanne Diamond League Meeting the following month would be his last competitive race for almost four years due to serious injury setbacks which included double Achillies surgery.
However, the 27-year-old burst back onto the scene in May of this year as he ran the Commonwealth Games standard in the United States.
Heyward has since gone from strength to strength, most recently taking more than five seconds of his own Welsh mile record as he finished third behind Josh Kerr as the Scot broke the 27-year-old mile world record in London.
The two men are due to be on the start lists again as the first round heats of the mile get underway, while Abi Pawlett contests the heptathlon long jump and javelin.
Wednesday evening could be a real night to remember for fans of Welsh throwing with potentially five athletes taking part in finals.
Adele Nicoll will hopefully have qualified for the women’s shot put final, while the men’s and women’s F42-44/61-64 will feature four of her team mates.
The men’s final features one of the true legends of Welsh sport in the shape of Aled Davies (Cardiff Athletics).
This will be Davies’ third Commonwealths having won silver the last time Glasgow hosted the event and gold in Birmingham four years ago.
The serial Paralympic and world champion has struggled with injury in recent years, but like Heyward, Davies has returned to form after surgery – last year winning his seventh consecutive F63 shot put World title.
Davies will be joined in the final by joint Welsh athletics team captain Harrison Walsh (Swansea Harriers), who shared the podium with his teammate last time around in Birmingham when he picked up a bronze medal.
It’s fitting Walsh is joint team captain as he originally made his name in rugby union where he was a promising front row forward with the Ospreys before suffering a career ending injury.
Since then, Walsh has gone on to excel in para throwing, having been selected for two Paralympics and winning World and European championships medals.
The women’s final features training partners and Cardiff Athletics club mates Funmi Oduwaiye and Bree Cronin, who will both be making their Commonwealth Games debuts.
However, neither are strangers to global competition. Oduwaiye represented Great Britain at the 2024 Paris Paralympics and won a bronze medal at last year’s World Para Athletics Championships in Delhi, where Cronin finished fifth.
The evening could also see Issy Boffey line up in the women’s 800m final, while Cari Hughes (Menai Track and Field) will be toeing the line in the women’s 3,000m final.
The multi-talented Hughes has excelled across a number of distances and disciplines including starring for Great Britain at a number of cross-country championships.
Last year, the 27-year-old turned her attention to the 3,000 steeplechase where she broke the Welsh record on her debut and went on to win a bronze medal at the UK Athletics Championships in Birmingham.
Meanwhile, Pawlett will round off her heptathlon challenge with the final discipline of the competition – the 800m.
Thursday morning’s session sees two Welsh athletes taking to the track in the first round of the women’s mile – Melissa Courtney-Bryant (Poole AC) and Ava Lloyd (Wigan and District Harriers and AC).
Courtney-Bryant is one of the most experienced and accomplished athletes on the Welsh team having competed at two previous Commonwealth Games – winning a bronze medal on the Gold Coast in 2018.
As such, the Welsh 1500m, 5,000m and indoor 3,000m record holder was a popular choice as joint athletics team captain alongside Harrison Walsh.
Meanwhile, 20-year-old Lloyd will be competing at her first Commonwealth Games having previously represented Great Britain at the European Under-23 Championships and the World Under-20 Championships where she placed fifth in the 1500m.
The session also features the women’s 400m semi-finals which will potentially feature Charlotte Henrich.
In the field, there will be another Commonwealth Games debutant in the shape of pole vaulter Tom Walley (Wrexham AC), who has already reached dizzying heights in the build up to the games by carrying the King’s Baton on a zipwire high above Penrhyn Quarry, fresh from winning a silver medal at the UK Athletics Championships.
The hugely proud Welshman will be hoping to claim his place in Saturday evening’s pole vault final as he lines up in the qualifying competition.
Thursday’s evening session is a relatively quiet one for the Welsh team, but it does feature the men’s 800m semi-final where they will be hopefully cheering on Justin Davies.
There are no Welsh athletes involved in Friday morning’s session, but the evening sees Olivia Breen return to centre stage in the women’s T37/38 long jump final.
Fingers will be firmly crossed that Issy Boffey is in the line-up for the evening’s 800m final.
The final day of the athletics calendar will hopefully see Charlotte Henrich contesting the women’s 400m final during the morning session.
And there is the potential for a spectacular finale to the games on Saturday evening. Tom Walley, Justin Davies, Jake Heyward Melissa Courtney-Bryant and Ava Lloyd could all be involved in finals during the last session of the games.