Historic day at Runaway Bay

It was a day of qualifiers, historic performances and personal bests at the Oceania Athletics Invitational Series on the Gold Coast, headlined by Queensland discus thrower Matthew Denny all but booking his ticket to Tokyo in the men’s discus.

Currently ranked number 8 in the world, Denny (Ben Thomson) not only met the Olympic qualifying standard tonight, but threw a new personal best to match. Throwing 66.15m on his second attempt, Denny said his qualifying performance was particularly victorious after encountering significant injury throughout the domestic season, including two rib injuries and a strained Costochondral joint.

“I’m feeling a huge sense of relief with confirmation of training, and how to compete with half decent conditions and atmosphere. I got injured in November and that took me back about three and a half months, and started the domestic season late, so to come back to where I was and I haven’t even peaked yet is really exciting,” Denny said.

 The qualifier also came just days after best friend and Australian high jumper Brandon Starc matched the Tokyo qualifying standard in Italy.

“Brandon and I were chatting last night. He got his 2.33 and I was so stoked for him and we were laughing, and he asked how I went that day, and I said not bad, just practised qualifying and he said, ‘Okay, well tomorrow… do it,’ and I said ‘fine!’ and it worked out well.

Peter Bol (Justin Rinaldi) continued his dominant domestic campaign, bettering last week’s 1:44.88 Olympic qualifier with a stunning performance of 1:44.62 – the fastest ever by an Australian on Australian soil.

“Last week I felt pretty strong but today there was no pressure, so we were hoping for 1:43 but I’m happy with that,” he said.

Bol appears ready to challenge training partner Jospeh Deng’s national record of 1:44.21 when he heads overseas this year, with the 27-year-old proud of his achievements on home soil this season.

“The good thing is we have been able to normalise 1:45 and now 1:44 in Australia. Someone else is going to make history one day and take my time, but it’s good that the standard started with us,” he said.

The soon to be two-time Olympian credits mentoring from Olympic gold medalist and Australian legend Sally Pearson as one of the major influences of his recent success.

“She said the goal is to break the gap between training and competition. At training I’ve been so relaxed, so I’ve been trying to focus on doing the same thing and implementing that in competition,” he said.

The Australian women competing in the 4x100m relay fell agonisingly short of the 43.04 required to punch their ticket to Tokyo, clocking 43.11 to record the fastest time in history by an Australian women’s team on Australian soil.

The immense task set to qualify in a time narrowly outside the national record of 42.99 should not dampen the outstanding performance, with the quartet delivering a world class performance on a windy afternoon at Runaway Bay.

The youthful team comprised of Taylah Cruttenden (Braiden Clarke), Bree Masters (Ryan Hoffman), Riley Day (Paul Pearce) and Hana Basic (John Nicolosi) were full of optimism post-race – knowing that they were deserving of a lane at this year’s Tokyo Olympics having run faster than many of the teams competing.

“We had a lot to work on from our last race where we blew out the cobwebs and we believed in ourselves, and we just ran the fastest we’ve ever run on home soil,” Day said.

“It’s so exciting because we’re so young and we can build on this for next year with Commonwealth Games and World Championships, we’re looking up and we’re coming for that national record.”

The comments were echoed by Basic, who emphasised the high ceiling of the team by acknowledging their limited time spent together to date.

“I think the most exciting part is that we have so much to work on and we ran 43.11 with two proper training sessions together,” Basic said.

Day later returned to run a scorching 11.18 (+2.7) over 100m to defeat Basic in 11.20, demonstrating just how well her training is going and setting up large improvements over the 200m in which she will compete in Tokyo.

The Australian women’s B 4 x 100m team clocked 43.90, illustrating the healthy depth that lies within this sprinting crop, while the men’s 4x100m team consisting of Jake Doran (Paul Di Bella), Simon Greig (Paul Pearce), Jack Hale (Adam Larcom) and Jake Penny (Matt Wade & Mandy Cole) made their way around the track in 38.98 to record the fourth fastest time in history by an Australian team on Australian soil.

Budding ambulant long jumper Ari Gesini (Sebastian Kuzminski) triumphantly jumped his second Paralympic qualifier since the Dubai 2019 World Para Athletics Championships, making him eligible for selection for the Australian Paralympic Team. 

Gesini jumped a B qualifier of 5.99m (1.4) on his first attempt, and followed up with another at 5.98m (1.8) – a feat he is incredibly proud of having encountered personal challenges and a bumpy road to recovery with injuries throughout the domestic season.

“I’m really proud of jumping the qualifying standard today. The last 18 months has brought so many challenges with COVID and I’ve also gone through a lot of personal challenges as of late, so I want to dedicate my result to my support network, and especially my family,” Gesini said.

“I’m feeling confident ahead of Tokyo and I’m looking forward to hopefully jumping another qualifier next week in Townsville.”

Another standout performance at Runaway Bay was high jumper Nicola McDermott (Matt Horsnell) who in her first meet after setting a new Australian record of 2.00m, cleared the bar at 1.96m. McDermott narrowly missed meeting her record but sailed over the bar at 1.96m with ease.

If four-time world champion Isis Holt (T35, Paul Pearce) hadn’t impressed enough this season, she proved she is close to her best form, running into a headwind of -2.6 yet still clocking an A qualifying time of 29.10.

Last week Samantha Schmidt (T38, Ralph Newton) threw her seventh qualifier in the discus throw, and today she added another A qualifier to her list of consistent performances, throwing 33.39m for her second best performance within the qualifying period.

Tokyo-bound Paralympic gold medallist James Turner (T36, Iryna Dvoskina) ran his fourth best 400m time in difficult conditions, crossing the line in 53.26, while Todd Hodgetts (F20, Scott Martin) thre his second B qualifier of 15.64m in the men’s shot put.

There were a number of strong performances from the Australian Under 20 team, who relished their second opportunity to compete in the green and gold against some of the nation’s best open aged athletes.

Tomysha Clark (Renae Clark) took out the women’s long jump with a leap of 6.49m securing a 20cm personal best and elevating her to fourth on the Australian Under 20 all-time list, only behind three athletes who all proceeded to become Olympians.

Jaylah Hancock-Cameron (Andae Kalemusic) also clinched a new personal best, running 4:12.42 to finish second in the women’s 1500m. The time moves Hancock-Cameron to sixth on the Australian Under 20 all-time list and makes her the fastest Australian junior since 2002.  The Australian Under 20 Representative Team is supported by Commonwealth Games Australia “Green to Gold to Great” program for the rising stars of Australian sport, as well as the City of Gold Coast.

The Oceania Athletics Invitational Series is proudly supported by the City of Gold Coast

Full results can be found here.

By Sascha Ryner and Lachlan Moorhouse, Athletics Australia
Posted: 12/6/2021