Glasgow, UK - When Lolo Jones crashed out of the Olympic 100m Hurdles final so dramatically last summer, she described the experience as being "like a car going max velocity when you hit a curve".

"You either maintain control or you crash and burn," she said. "Today I crashed and burned."

Jones will be hoping for plenty of burn and no crashes when she opens her 2009 season at the Aviva International Match in Glasgow on Saturday (31 January).

Jones competes for USA in the traditional curtain raiser to the UK’s international indoor season, a five-way team competition between Britain, Germany, Sweden, USA and a Commonwealth Select side at Kelvin Hall.

Despite her devastating tumble in Beijing, the World Indoor 60m Hurdles champion will be the star attraction at the intimate meeting which has often provided useful pointers for the season to come.

Jones claims to be ‘a month ahead of schedule’ compared to last year’s preparations (according to her IAAF online diary), despite a hectic programme of media work and promotional activity in the months since her outdoor season closed last September.

‘I feel like my rhythm is at the same stage as it was in the middle of the last indoor season,’ she says – which bodes well for her and serves as a warning to the rest of the world’s top sprint hurdlers.

Barring mishaps, Jones should find it relatively comfortable on Saturday. In the absence of Susanna Kallur, the World indoor record holder who has won here for Sweden for the last six years, the American will have little real competition.

Britain’s Sarah Claxton, who has already run 8.09 this season, could be her closest rival, while Andrea Bliss of Jamaica is also in the line-up.

Claxton is part of a British team that will be hoping to repeat last year’s exciting win.

The home grown stars on show include Craig Pickering, a world class indoor sprinter who picked up the European 60m silver two years ago and will going for gold in Turin in a few weeks time.

Pickering faces Kim Collins, the former World 100m champion, who races for the Commonwealth Select in both 60m and 200m. Collins comes up against Johan Wissman, Sweden’s world indoor 400m silver medallist, in the longer race.

Tyler Christopher, the man who beat Wissman in Valencia last year, also opens his season in Glasgow. The Canadian represents the Commonwealth team in the 400m against Britain’s Richard Buck and Jamaal Torrance of USA.

Another Valencia champion, Angela Williams, begins her 2009 campaign with a 60m contest against Britain’s 100m record holder Montell Douglas and Chandra Sturrup of the Bahamas, while the World Indoor Long Jump champion, South Africa’s Godfrey Mokoena, faces European outdoor silver medallist, Greg Rutherford of Britain, as well as Norris Frederick of USA.

Richard Kiplagat of Kenya runs for the Commonwealth in the 800m, while Britain’s Mo Farah leads the British challenge in the longer distances. The European 5000m silver medallist will be racing over 3000m.

Other notable Britons in the men’s events include Steve Lewis, the world’s number three pole vaulter so far this year. Lewis set a personal best of 5.75m in Manchester two weeks ago and on Saturday a strong field including Jeremy Scott of USA, Germany’s Alexander Straub and Alhaji Jeng of Sweden.

Britain is well represented in the High Jump too, with Tom Parsons competing for the home country and Samson Oni for the Commonwealth. They will have tough competition, though, in the shape of Germany’s Raul Spank who almost delivered a huge shock to win a medal in Beijing. Spank eventually placing fifth in the Olympic final with a personal best of 2.32m.

In the women’s 800m, Olympic semi-finallist Marilyn Okoro will have the first of this year’s series of tough battles against her compatriot Jenny Meadows, who goes for the Commonwealth.

Kelly Sotherton was due to compete in the 60m Hurdles and Long Jump, but the reigning European Indoor Pentathlon silver medallist, withdrew this week with a sore back sustained while training at a UK Athletics camp in South Africa.

Matthew Brown for the IAAF