NEWPORT sprinter Christian Malcolm has admitted that he may pull out of this weekend's Great Britain trials if a flu bug picked up last week doesn't clear up in time.

Malcolm only returned to training on Tuesday having missed over a week because of the bug.

Malcolm was set to pull-out of this weekend's trials at the Alexander Stadium in Birm-ingham but the 200m star changed his mind and will now leave any decision until tomorrow night.

Failure to compete in the trial will result in Malcolm missing out on a place in the GB team for next month's World Champion-ships in Paris.

"I'm going to give myself as long as possible to recover from this," said Malcolm. "It's not ideal preparation and at one point I did consider pulling out.

"Although I have return-ed now, I could have done with that extra week of training. Gateshead show-ed that I'm back to my best but I still have things to work to get even better.

"I haven't been able to go 100 per cent this week because of the flu, it's very frustrating. But if I'm not fully fit I will pull out but I'll leave that decision until the night before."

In fact, Malcolm is not the only Welsh athlete suffering with the flu bug. Fellow 200m star Darren Campbell is also struggling and 400m star Katharine Merry has pulled out with tonsilitis.

Malcolm is desperate to put his disappointing indoor season behind him and make the Great Britain team event.

But he knows he faces an uphill battle to make the 100m team and, more importantly, the 200m team with the cream of British sprinting all fit and raring to.

And Malcolm has admitted that the hard work of Gateshead will be quickly forgotten when the athletes line-up this weekend.

"It was great to win at Gateshead as people seem to have written me off," said Malcolm.

"I think you could see in my reaction after the race that I was relieved to have won but that will count for nothing if I don't win or come second on Sunday.

"People will soon forget Gateshead and, as soon as I won that, I was immediately thinking of this weekend.

"I just hope that I'm fully fit and over the flu so that I can compete on an even keel with the rest of the athletes."