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The men’s 4x400m relay team has moved one step closer to confirming a lane in London after clocking 3:01.58 for second at the Colorful Daegu Meet in Daegu (KOR) this evening.
 

 

Lead out by national champion Steve Solomon (NSW), the baton was then handed to world championships bronze medallist Ben Offereins (WA) and Olympic nominee Brendan Cole (ACT) before Australian FlameTristan Thomas (Tas) brought the team home.

 

The impressive run sees the aggregate two-time performance of the team improve to 6:03.14 (3:01.56 from the IAAF world championships and 3:01.58 tonight). When compared to the IAAF rankings issued on March 2, 2012, the Australian team sits 10th overall and well within the top-16 countries, who will make up the starters at the Olympic Games.

 

Solomon, who was competing on his 19th birthday, said: “That was awesome, the race couldn’t have gone better. My own 400 was as solid as I wanted it to be, and from what I could see of the other boys’ runs we were strong across the board.

 

“We knew what we had to do here and to come away with a result that essentially sets us up the best we can for London is great, it certainly makes for a great birthday.

 

“I’m so pumped for the team as a whole, this is something that we knew would come but to now have it is oh so sweet. The times seemed to take forever to come up on the screen but its amazing how quickly lactic acid disappears when a result like that pops up.”

 

A second Australian team of Sean Wroe (Vic), Alex Beck (Qld), Matt Lynch (NSW) and Alex Carew (Vic) were third in 3:07.29.

 

Meanwhile in the women's 1500m Kaila McKnight (Vic) and Zoe Buckman (Vic) started, while Jeff Riseley (Vic) lined up in the men's 800m.

 

Eunice Jepkoech Sum (KEN) won the women’s event in a time of 4:05.99, with Meskerem Assefa (4:05.62) second and McKnight third (4:05.64). All three placegetters times were below the previous world lead of 4:07.00. Buckman was fourth in 4:07.25.

 

In the men’s event, Riseley placed sixth in 1:45.98. Mohammed Aman (ETH) won the event in a meet record time of 1:43.51, with Leonard Kirwa Kosencha (KEN, 1:44.74) second and Andreas Bube (DEN, 1:45.27) third.

 

McKnight and Riseley will next start in the women’s 1500m and men’s 800m respectively at Round 2 of the Samsung Diamond League on Saturday night.

 

In other Australian results:

-       Australian championship silver medallist Beck won the men’s 400m ‘B’ Race in 46.73, with Wroe, who raced for the first time since having his appendix removed, was second in 47.21.

-       Vicky Parnov cleared 4.00m in the women’s pole vault, the same height she did at the Doha Diamond League this past weekend. The event was won by Anastasia Savchenko (RUS) with a 4.60m jump.

-       Brandon Starc (NSW) sailed over 2.10m in the men’s high jump to meet his pre-departure standard for the 2011 IAAF world junior championships. He placed 7th overall.

-       Ignisious Gaisah (GHA) won the men’s long jump with a 7.99m leap, with Robbie Crowther (ACT) 11th thanks to a 7.12m best mark.

 

The IAAF is expected to reissue official relay rankings during May, via its website www.iaaf.org.

 

For full results from the Colorful Daegu Meet, please click here.

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Hi Runnerstribe, 

The last few weeks have been up there with the busiest of my life to date. With Year 12 HSC Trial exams and with just over a month until the World Championships, I had plenty to do both academically and athletically.

Training throughout June and July had been great. I was running really fast and my strong base work from a couple of months ago is paying dividends with my endurance. Since my last blog, I have very much begun speed work. Two of my three training sessions each week involve a speed foundation, with speed endurance sessions rounding out the third session. I’ve been feeling really strong, and certainly feeling more powerful then I have ever before. I think this is attributed to my “walking drill’s” and core stability work Fira (my coach) has gotten the squad doing after each session. The kind of exercises we do are lunges, walking squats, crab walk etc. Because I currently do not have a gym component to my training, this kind of strength training makes me a lot stronger.

Another pleasing aspect to my progression over the last few weeks have been my starts. Still young and without the gym component, I have been known to lack ‘power’ and explosiveness off my starts. However, having my first session out of blocks two weeks ago, I am pleased to report my starts are improving. I am feeling a lot more powerful without having to work strenuously hard; something my coach and I are very pleased about.

Last week (28/07), I ran a time trial in training over 400. I would like to take the opportunity to thanks all those who helped make the time trial possible, including my training squad, David Tarbotton and many many others. I felt really good. Running in chilly conditions, both Fira and I were very happy with the run.

Leading into the World Championships, to me, it is imperative to run a 11. last 100m. If the time trial was any sort of indicator, it could be very possible.

Well… 3 weeks out from the World Championships…. Time has certainly gone fast since nationals. Ill blog closer to the championships but I thought I’d give you my present thoughts.
A common question, I’d imagine everyone is curious to know is “how do you think you will go at the World Championships?”.

Well, for the moment, I can only forge the following answer, with many determinants that can influence how we as a team run at the Championships:

I have tried to look at where we are as a team. But, with the team spread out all over the world, I think it is only appropriate that I base my response around myself. I personally, am feeling very good and very confident that we as a team can excel at the championships. I feel that everything is on track for me personally, and both my coach and I are share the same thoughts. I’ve been running better then I have before, training harder then I have before and running faster then I have before. As for the rest of the team, they too from what I can gather are also on track in terms of their personal preparation. It doesn’t take a guru to acknowledge the experience of my team mates, with an array of medals and achievements on all stages of athletics that are unmatched by many who wear the tights and spikes of our sport. I haven’t personally spoken to Ben, Sean or John in a while, but I am confident that they know what they each need to do. They all have coaches who are very experienced and have a good reputation for seeing their athletes ‘peak’ at the right time. In spite of Australia’s “weaker” domestic race times then in the past, I am confident we all, as a team will be ready to run faster then we ever have before, and represent both our country and the team to the best of our abilities.

When you look at the four of us, the one thing you can never take away is our fight, out determination to give our all every time we step onto the track. I think I speak for the team when I say that we will do no different in three weeks time.

As I said earlier, ill give a more ‘updated’ response in a few weeks time.

 

For the next few weeks, with trial exams over, just about my full focus will be on athletics. I am really looking forward to my last few weeks of training before I leave. I will be doing a few 100, 200 and 300m time trials in the upcoming weeks, to give me an indication on my speed and speed endurance progression.

Finally before I go, I’d like to express my admiration and congratulations to all the Australian athletes who have been competing in Europe over the last few months. It has been great to see Sally leading by example, with many many others achieving personal bests and showing us that their preparations are well on track.

For now, I saw goodbye. Train hard, keep healthy and ill be back in a few weeks to give my final thoughts heading into my first IAAF World Championships.

Cheers,

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Hi Runnerstribe,

I’m back to fill you in on my latest training endeavours.

Since my last blog, I have partaken in what is commonly known as “winter’ or “base” training.

Training kicked off in early May with heart rate controlled 20min jogs. This dampened my initial thoughts of the base training, which were hyped up by my squad at Team Fira to be lactic city, where everyone was momentarily enervated and incapacitated.

The next week, we resumed training with a new program. It was when I received this program that I began to come to the reality of base training. 50min Fartlek runs, heart rate controlled, followed by walking and hurdles drills. As one of my training partners astutely remarked; “welcome to winter training solo”.

The sessions began to get longer and at higher tempo’s. All this was tough, but made bearable by the support of the squad. We enjoyed about a month of these kinds of sessions, a typical weeks track sessions looking similar to:

Monday	Wednesday	Saturday
*10x200m off 2min (tempo) *Walking drills	*2 sets of 4x1min runs (target distance)   *Walk drills	*45min Fartlek run, T/HR 160bpm with 100m sprint every 10min *Walk drills

 

Shortly after came the infamous stairs. One thing I learned to love about the stairs session was no matter how fast or slow you ran, you still felt equally fatigued after the session.

We undertook these sessions at Cooper Park, a heavily inclined stair course with I would guess had between 80-90 stairs. As all of you whom done stairs would know, the easy part is going up, the hard part is going down. The squad quickly acquired “the shakes”, with none other then Ben Southwell leading the charge, both with the ‘shakes’, in addition to the lactic spews.

I think one session sums up our stairs endeavour, with that being a bright and early morning on the Queen’s birthday long weekend. The rain was bucketing! We all completed the session as planned, but being under the influence of lactic acid, made some ill-educated decisions…. Such as collapsing onto the side walk into a puddle, only to be further drowned by an on-going cars splashes.

The best part of the stairs session, was the end. Not because you were relieved of further pain, but rather because of the thought of the Pasta Pantry baguette. A Team Fira tradition; after stairs, we would go have breakfast at a nearby café.

That bought us right up until the 20^th June.  Training is now shifting towards a more speed-based sessions. My first speed session back was on Monday:

100, 120, 140, 160, 180, 200 (3,4,5,6,10,10 min between)

I raced in the Gold Coast on the weekend, in my first 400m since nationals. Fortunately, I was able to get the better of a strong field, and although the time wasn’t super flash, the run was important. After a long recollection with Tristan Thomas, we both concluded that the times of high 46’s (46.75) were less important, and the fact that we ran such a time in less then favourable conditions and so early suggest that we’re on track. Its also great to see that others Australian athletes are finding their bearings, and running quick times for this time of year.

Until next time, train hard and keep healthy.

 

Cheers,

by Chris Wainwright

by Chris Wainwright.

It's now time for the junior men's review for 2009. In a year where we saw some very exciting performances, especially from the likes of Ryan Gregson and Henry Frayne, there is much anticipation surrounding the 2010 track and field year.

What can we expect from our athletes at the World Junior Championships in July? Will we see another athlete step up and perform to the levels of Gregson and Frayne? Another very interesting year is just around the corner - bring on 2010.

1500m - Weltklasse Zurich