124th NSW Track & Field Championships - Preview

4 March 2021

NSW Track & Field Championships - Preview

This weekend the 124th NSW Track and Field Championships will be held at Sydney Olympic Park. The inaugural championships were held in 1888 on the Recreation Ground in Ashfield. The only years they were not held were 1891 and 1894 and during World War I (1917 to 1920) and World War II (1941-1944). Fortunately the 2020 and 2021 editions have survived COVID.

With the busy Track Classic schedule about to get underway in earnest, the championships have attract NSW’s best to the prestigious state championships. Here are few highlights.

Women’s high jump

A quality field of five 1.80m plus jumpers line up here. Nicola McDermott (SYU) has been a picture of consistency with her last 12 competitions at 1.90m or higher, including 1.92m at last year’s state championships. Her training partner, Emily Whelan (ADM) set her PB of 1.85m 12 months ago at this track and after starts this year of 1.82m and 1.83m will be pressing her PB. World Championships and Commonwealth Games representative, Alysha Burnett (CHE) is jumping well and has already been over 1.87m this summer. Two World U20 Championships qualifiers, Rose Tozer (WOL) and Erin Shaw (UTN) will be looking for more qualifiers to press their selection claims.

Women’s 400m

The best field ever assembled for this event is headed by world championships semi-finalists Bendere Oboya (UTN). She looks in shape to clock her first sub-52 seconds run in 18 months, since the 2019 Doha World Championships. Olympic relay finalist Anneliese Rubie (SYU), injured for much of 2019 made a great return to racing this summer with two runs either side of 53 seconds. Queensland junior Ellie Beer has run a couple of low 53s this year, lines up with Rubie’s Rio Olympic relay finalist team mate Jessica Thornton (ILL). But the form of Bella O’Grady (UTN) is a mystery as she lines up for her first race in over 18 months due to injury. Her last races were rather impressive: heats 2019 World Championships, preceded by 51.87 in the semis at the World University Games where in the final she placed seventh and collected a bronze in the 4x400m relay.

Women’s Ambulant 200m

Two strong NSW hopes for Paralympic selection are sprinters Mali Lovell (UTN) and Tamsin Colley (HIL). Although the Tokyo program includes a T36 100m, they are closest to the T36 200m standards of ‘A’ 30.45 and ‘B’ 31.60. They both could have nailed the standard at the recent ACT Championships, but for a 2.0m/s headwind. Mali has clocked a lifetime best of 32.12 this summer, while Rio Paralympian Tamsin has been regularly in the low to mid 32 seconds this summer.

Men 100m

Rohan Browning (SYU) is set to fire at the NSW Championships. Our amazing photo-finish team will prepare the venue to run the 100m with the wind..…meaning anything could happen in perfect conditions. The battle for the medals will be a highlights, with those in the mix, 10.24 athlete Chris Ius (UTN), defending champion Nick Andrews (CHE), internationals Joshua Azzopardi (CMD) and Zach Holdsworth (ILL).

Men 400m

Olympic finalists Steve Solomon (RBH) will be making his second outing this summer after his 46.11 debut in December. A year ago he was in PB shape, let’s hope he is back there again. He will need to be sharp as Tyler Gunn (GOS) and Louis Stenmark (UTN) clocked excellent times of 46.41 and 46.80 in recent weeks. Also under 47 seconds in defending champion Ian Halpin (BAN) with 46.74 in Canberra 10 days ago. A threat looks to be Jordan Sarmento (UTN) who has only run 47.66, but looks to be progressing well indicated by some sharp 200m times.

Men High Jump

In his season debut 10 days ago in Canberra, Brandon Starc (PAR) was instantly back where he was in previous seasons, clearing 2.27m with ease. In Sydney he will receive competition from the country’s best junior line-up and a couple of seniors on track to raise their PB. Matthew Tilley (SYP) and Angus Clark (ILL) have been this summer just 1cm below their PBs, so those standards of 2.16m and 2.10m will be their obvious target. Defending champion is 18-year-old Jono Titmarsh (TRI) who leapt just 2.15m and 2.16m in his only two competitions last summer and made a nice season debut 10 days ago clearing 2.10m. 17-year-old Darcy Holmes (UTN) has cleared 2.08m early summer, raising his best to 2.10m this year. Teenagers Will Moir (TRI) and Nicholas Kollias (RBH), with PBs of 2.05m and 2.10m, make this a high quality event.

A plethora of individual stars will be competing including: Monique Quirk, Abbie Taddeo, Michelle Jenneke, Sara Klein, Alexandra Hulley, Mackenzie Little, Nick Hough, Cameron McEntyre, Alec Diamond, Alexander Kolesnikoff, Emmanuel Fakiye and Connor Murphy.

David Tarbotton for Athletics NSW

Image: Tamsin Colley and Mali Lovell (courtesy of David Tarbotton)