Olympic Stadium on top of the worlds

ON TRACK ... Olympic Stadium being lined up as 2017 host

ATHLETICS chiefs are to launch a bid to stage the 2017 World Championships at London's Olympic Stadium.

Just days after West Ham were announced as the preferred bidder to take over the Stadium after London 2012 - keeping the track in place - it has emerged work is already under way to bring the Worlds to Britain for the FIRST time.

And Spurs and Leyton Orient have been warned off any lengthy legal challenges to the decision on the future of the Olympic Stadium for fears it could wreck London's bid.

UK Athletics plan to lodge their interest in hosting the World Championships with the IAAF - the sport's governing body - next month before a final decision is announced in November.

A bid for London to host the 2015 Worlds had to be abandoned last October due to continuing uncertainty over the future of the Olympic Stadium.

Spurs had pledged to rip up the arena and track if they were chosen as future tenants and planned to compromise by re-vamping the decaying Crystal Palace stadium for athletics.

The move gifted rival bidders Beijing the 2015 championships at the Bird's Nest Stadium - with the Chinese confirmed as hosts last November.

Ed Warner, chairman of UK Athletics, told SunSport: "We have to lodge a letter of interest next month and over the next few weeks we will work with the Government and the Mayor of London to get all the funding in place.

"We also have to ensure that there is no uncertainty over this stadium whatsoever. We don't want a repeat of last year when we got to the wire and then had to pull out.

"We don't want to take any proposal to the IAAF that has any uncertainty. If people are talking of legal actions and all those sort of things we don't want that hanging over the Stadium.

"If a lengthy legal challenge threatens to hamper the bid I am not going to take that risk.

"I think we have a store of goodwill with the IAAF which was demonstrated by their support of West Ham's plan to keep the track. I don't want to do anything to dilute that goodwill.

"I could never have put my hand on my heart and asked the IAAF to bring the World Championships to a re-vamped Crystal Palace.

"But I can take this proposal to them and say 2015 is at the Bird's Nest Stadium so bring 2017 to Stratford. I think that is a great proposition."

Spurs, who lost out to rival bidders West Ham, and Leyton Orient, who fear they could be driven out of business by the Hammers' move to the nearby Olympic Stadium, have already threatened legal action.

West Ham are considering putting re-tractable seats on the track to appease their fans - but these could be moved back to host the World Championships in the summer of 2017.

Sports minister Hugh Robertson is hopeful the Government will underwrite the 2017 bid.

The World Championships, first launched in 1983, are now staged every two years. This summer they will be in Daegu, South Korea with Moscow hosting the 2013 event.

It was in Berlin two years ago that Olympic champion Usain Bolt smashed his own 100m and 200m world records to stamp his mark on the sport.