Douglas and Hull Rewrite Records

The summer of athletics is heating up in Australia, but it was US-based Australians Jessica Hull and Chris Douglas bringing the heat in the northern hemisphere with a pair of Australian indoor records over the weekend. 

Hull (Pete Julian) opened her season with a scorching 8:39.79 over 3000m indoors to finish in second place at the Ted Nelson Invitational in Texas and add a fifth Australian record to her name, with the 25-year-old now the fastest Australian woman ever over 1500m, 3000m and 5000m outdoors, along with the 1500m and 3000m indoors. 

The performance shaved close to three seconds off Benita Willis’ former mark of 8:42.75, a feat that she says is a step in the direction whilst acknowledging the class of Willis.

“Benita’s record stood for 21-years which shows how strong of a performance it was at the World Indoor Championships in 2001. Times are one thing, but Benita had an incredible record at major championships as well to support her records which is hopefully something I can start to replicate,” she said.

Douglas (Joey Woods) bounced back from 2021’s Olympic heartache when narrowly missing qualification through ranking in the 400m hurdles, registering a blistering 7.67 in the 60m hurdles at Iowa – surpassing Kyle Vander Kuyp’s 7.73 national record and qualifying for the World Athletics Indoor Championships.

"I really wanted to represent Australia at the Olympics and still have that as a goal going forward, but right now I am excited about the prospect of making my first senior team for the World Indoors in March this year,” he said. 

Still in the USA and it was Patrick Tiernan (Mark Rowland) who climbed his way to fourth on the Australian all-time list in the half marathon, running 1:00:55 to finish in sixth place at Houston. Tiernan raced with the lead pack until the closing stages, rewarded with a shiny new personal best to set up his 2022 campaign. 

Olympic 800m man Charlie Hunter (Pete Julian) made a strong impression at his professional debut, recording a neat indoor double of 4:00.86 to win the mile and 1:48.29 to finish in third place of the 800m. 

Olympian Ed Trippas and Canberra’s Duncan Miller donned the orange of Princeton University as they got their seasons underway with a pair of personal bests over an indoor mile in Washington, with Miller stopping the clock in 3:57.04 and Trippas 4:02.07.  

Other international results included Imogen Barrett’s (Floridia) 2:05.64 win over 800m, whilst Lauren Ryan (Florida State) and Carley Thomas (Washington) clocked 4:38.60 and 4:46.18 to win their respective indoor mile races and kick-start 2022. 

By Lachlan Moorhouse, Athletics Australia
Posted: 17/01/2022