Australia came out well on top of the overall medal table in the last Commonwealth Games in Delhi three years ago, racking up 74 gold, 55 silver and 48 bronze medals, with 20 of those medals coming in track and field events, finishing ahead of the host nation India and old sporting rivals England.

Athletics Australia want to ensure that this position is retained in Glasgow next year.

"The main aim of the Policy is to nominate quality athletes for selection by the Australian Commonwealth Games Association in order to finish as the top nation at the Commonwealth Games on both the medal table and the points table," said Athletics Australia high performance director Simon Nathan.

Australia performed well on the track at Delhi 2010, winning the men's 4x100m relay among other events

"This will be a challenge because Scotland will be at home for the first time since 1986 and they will be fighting for every place in front of a very patriotic crowd, and also because England will send a large team as they are almost at home too.

"As well as athletes with good times, distances, heights and scores, we want to prioritise athletes who show that they can perform well on the day.

"With this in mind we have given weight to athletes who perform well in our best domestic competitions, the Australian Athletics Tour and especially the Australian Athletics Championships, and who have performed well at a recent global championship."

The qualification period for the 10,000 metres, marathon, women's heptathlon, men's decathlon and T54 class wheelchair races began on January 1 2013, with other track and field qualification periods to begin on October 1 this year.

The qualification period will run from these dates throughout the entire Australian athletics season, with the period for all events except the marathon and 10,000m ending on June 1 2014, before the Games are due to get underway on July 23 and run for 12 days.

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