Jonny Hay had a simple message to convey in his captain's speech last night at the British team's hotel ahead of the world cross-country championships in Guiyang.

"Put everything on the line," he urged. "It will hurt, but you won't be disappointed."

Should his premonition come to pass this morning, Rhona Auckland has built up ample toleration for pain that may stand her good stead. This Chinese odyssey will be the first race for the 21-year-old since she marched triumphantly to the European title in Bulgaria four months ago, a hiatus filled to the brim with frustration.

It all started with a twinge in her left Achilles. And then the right. In between, steroids - under doctor's advice - were injected into her heel to reduce some of the inflammation. A medical science student at Edinburgh University, the ability to conduct a risk analysis was a blessing and a curse.

"Knowledge is powerful but also not because knowing too much is not a good thing," she admits. "I switch off my medical brain and focus on my athletics brain - and it was telling me it was necessary thing to get back to running."

It has rendered it impossible to set a legitimate target at the biennial championships where her primary opposition will, in reality, be GB&NI team-mate Gemma Steel. Yet in claiming a continental title, Auckland has already produced a fine winter's work, one worthy of recognition beyond the sphere of mud and rain.

There were generous plaudits, she attests, in the wake of capturing European gold. "It was really overwhelming. I don't particularly enjoy being in the spotlight but people were so nice and supportive." Excepted from that list are those who dish out the Lottery funding at UK Athletics, hamstrung by the strict parameters imposed by UK Sport that decree only Olympic events to be worth their salt.

There is a sliver of hope that absolutism may be changed, that those - like Mo Farah, previously - who excel on the outdoor terrain should achieve parity at least with those who deliver medals indoors.

"I was down in Loughborough this month getting medical support but that was because I was going to China," Auckland reveals. "Once I'd seen the set-up down there which funding athletes get, I was jealous.

"I'm lucky I get great support from Edinburgh University. I get a SportsAid grant as well. I'm well looked after. But I'd agree cross-country doesn't get the recognition it deserves. I use it because it gives me a strong winter base so I can use that when I come out on the track. And that's where I'd have to earn any recognition."

Without neither senior men's or women's teams despatched, it seems a long shot that Auckland nor her fellow Scot Andy Butchart will return with more than snapshots for souvenirs. Likewise, neither of the British junior squads, Inverclyde's Jonny Glen included, look capable of combining for a podium tilt. The IAAF has done little to nurture what was once a championship with an A-List cast. Yet even Africa's second rank will be too strong and too quick.

Banchory's hopeful will not give up the pursuit before she turns her attention to the track campaign, and beyond that a switch to university in New Mexico. "I'm going to cross the line 100% dead," she pledged. "How high up that leaves up is up in the air. I'm going in naively. There's a quote Laura Muir and Emilia Gorecka have which is about being fearless. I am young. It's a senior race. I've got nothing to lose. And I feel I should just go for it."

- Derek and Callum Hawkins will lead Kilbarchan's challenge to Central's recent monopoly in today's Scottish Road Relay Championships in Livingston.