Breaking Down to Breaking Through | Billings Returns to World Stage

At the age of 18, Sarah Billings' first Australian tracksuit arrived with a ticket to Poland for the World Under 20 Championships; running was easy. The teenager didn’t envision a series of injuries that would warp her belief in her own body, let alone a wait of 7 years, 2 months and 13 days for her next opportunity on the world stage.

Finishing in 14^th place of the Road Mile at the inaugural World Athletics Road Running Championships in Latvia this month, Billings confirmed her own sanity. Making the jump from a decorated junior career to the senior ranks can be difficult at the best of times, but the 25-year-old’s voice holds more merit than most when conveying the importance of patience and persistence.  

“It’s so hard to transition from a junior to a senior. You go from winning a lot of races to not winning a lot of races. You have to have perspective and there are a lot of ways to improve and reach your goals without making teams, like running PB’s and improving your tactics. It’s important to adjust,” Billings says.

“I’ve learned so much. At that World Juniors was my first serious injury, and basically since then I’ve had a lot of obstacles along the way. I have learned so much about my body, what I can handle and what I can’t. The biggest goal is to stay healthy, because consistency is the key – if you can string a lot of weeks together.”

Billings is one for details, she distinguishes between the femoral neck and femoral shaft when rattling off a long list of stress fractures, but it’s that same attention to detail that left her feeling hopeless every time her diligent recovery came unstuck. The Victorian has spent countless hours at specialist appointments and scans in a bid to rebuild her relationship with her body, refusing to revert career aspirations to her double degree in architecture and construction management.

“Pretty much every day, the thought of getting injury will cross my mind. Every decision I make is about whether I can still be healthy. For every injury I have had, I have probably had another three scans afterwards thinking it had come back,” Billings says.

“I have had so many phantom MRI’s it’s not funny. It does kind of does scar you, my doctor told me that when you have had a lot of injuries, your mind can start to play tricks on you. It can read pain as really harmful and magnify the signals that it’s not good.”

Having notched up times of 4:06.77 for 1500m and 2:01.66 over 800m, Billings has largely been a casualty of Australia’s middle-distance resurgence in the form of limited representative opportunities, but she continues to close the gap slowly but surely on the nation’s best.  

Racing internationally under the Melbourne Track Club banner and the guidance of coach Nic Bideau, the former sprinter has accumulated a wealth of racing experience that has seen her refine her craft, now building the fitness required to make her a threat at the 2024 Australian Track and Field Championships.

“It’s so hard to make the Australian team in the 1500m at the moment, literally the four fastest Australian girls we’ve ever had are running. If you do make that team, you know that you are capable of making the final,” Billings says.

“You can’t say no to representing Australia. I hadn’t heard anything [about the World Road Running Championships] by the start of August, so I took a break. I’m glad I did that because I was already mentally pretty fatigued after the European season.”

With Billings’ brother Jack having played 152 games to date for St Kilda in the AFL, the two share a unique bond over the highs and lows of elite sport.

“We understand what each other are going through. It’s really helpful to have someone who gets it in your immediate circle, and we are similar in a lot of ways in how we approach our sport and how much we love it. When that’s taken away from you through injury, we both take that pretty hard,” Billings says.

With plans to “sprinkle” some 5km races amongst her 2024 campaign which sees her leaning more towards the 1500m than the 800m, Billings will not only be waiting, but pushing to become a regular contender for Australian teams.

By Lachlan Moorhouse, Athletics Australia
Posted: 14/10/2023