Suffolk athlete Emily Moyes celebrated a notable victory when representing England at the Loughborough International last Sunday.

The Stowmarket-based 20-year-old won the 3,000m steeplechase in a time of 10mins 22.23secs, and is now targeting a qualifying time for the European Under-23 Athletics Championships, to be staged in Sweden in July.

Moyes won a tactical race at Loughborough, improving on her third spot from last year's race in the same competition, when she set her current personal best of 10:16.46.

"I was in two minds going into the race," explained Moyes, who has just finished her studies at St Mary's University in Twickenham.

"I just wanted to go out hard, and try and get a personal best, but my coach (Mick Woods) told me to just race it, and have some fun. He said that the time will come, and just to run a tactical race. I decided to listen to my coach, and got the win.

"It was my first 3K steeplechase event of the year, so I was feeling my way back into the distance.

"I held back until the last kilometre, and then went for it, with 600 metres to go.

"My PB is 10:16, but I think I am capable of running sub 10 minutes. I need to go 22 seconds faster than I did last weekend, but I ran the last 1K on 10-minute pace, so I think I can.

"I was going to run in Belgium this weekend, to try and get the qualifying time (10:00), but in my most recent training session I still felt tired from last weekend's race.

"So instead I plan to run at Birmingham on June 6, where I hope to get the time in a competitive race," added Moyes.

Former Stowmarket High School pupil Moyes, who was in the same academic year as fellow international athlete Harry Hughes (javelin thrower, who also won at the Loughborough event), began running for local club Stowmarket Striders before moving to West Suffolk AC in 2014.

Last year, she joined Aldershot, Farnham & District, and earlier this month she finished second over the 2,000m steeplechase (6:38.40) at the British Universities Championships (BUCS) in Bedford, having won the title in the previous two years.

Moyes represented Team GB at the European Cross Country Championships last December.