Paula Radcliffe and Dwain Chambers have been named athletes of the year by the British Athletics Writers' Association.

The awards for the best British female and male athlete of 2003 were announced at the 40th BAWA dinner on Saturday night.

Radcliffe was also given the Norwich Union award for outstanding achievement in a British vest for her gold medal at the European Championships in Munich.

Her time in the 10,000 metres was the second fastest ever run by a woman.

Radcliffe's awards cap a year which, in addition to her Munich win, has seen her take gold at the Commonwealth Games and World Cross Country Championships.

The 28-year-old also won the London and Chicago marathons - the latter in a new world record for the distance - and collected an MBE from the Queen.

Chambers was rewarded for his European 100m gold and a series of victories over Olympic champion Maurice Greene and world record holder Tim Montgomery.

He also equalled Linford Christie's European 100m record, which had stood for nine years.

Other award winners were long jump and triple jump star Jonathan Moore (best junior male) and World Junior 200m champion Vernicha James (best junior female).

Chris Brasher and John Disley, founders of the London Marathon in 1981, were given the Ron Pickering Memorial Award for services to British athletics.

And Khalid Khannouchi won the BAWA award for outstanding achievement for his marathon world record.

Khannouchi's record was the first in an Olympic men's running event since David Bedford set a world's best 10,000m in 1973.