Adelaide Track Classic live stream: Australia’s fastest man Rohan Browning and his quest to break magical 10-second barrier

Sprinter Rohan Browning captured the attention of a nation at the Tokyo Olympics. Now, the fastest man in Australia is out to create more history. He opens up exclusively.

Rohan Browning couldn’t think of a better place to start his ascent of Everest than in Adelaide.

Don’t worry, there hasn’t been a career-change to mountaineering. When Australia’s fastest man talks about trying to “summit Everest” he’s referring to breaking the magical 10-second barrier.

Browning will have his first hit-out of the new season at the Adelaide Grand Prix on Saturday night – an event to be live streamed on News Corp websites – on a track where he has very fond memories.

Back in 2014 on his first visit to the City of Churches, Browning and Jack Hale made headlines around the country in the fastest junior race in history.

The 16-year-olds shattered the clock at the Australian All Schools Championships with Hale (10.13sec) running down Browning over the last few metres (10.18sec).

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Rohan Browning will be in action at the Adelaide Track Classic on Saturday. Picture: John Feder/The Australian.

“I am always excited about my first run of the season and I have run some of my best times from the season straight off the bat,” Browning says.

“People always label it as a bit of a rust-buster or get the cobwebs out but I’m not going to stigmatise it.

“Adelaide in particular is a special track for me as that is where I sort of broke out in 2014 when I was a junior in that race with Jack Hale when we were young.

“I did run in a meet in Adelaide a few months later but other than that I haven’t been back since 2015.”

Browning returns as one of the most recognisable faces in Australian sport after his heroics at last year’s Tokyo Olympics where he captured the attention of a nation by winning his 100m heat in 10.01sec.

He took down a former world champion in the process and then held his own in the Olympic semi-final which sparked his desire to become one of the fastest men on the planet.

“After the Olympics I had a new-found confidence, almost a new-found dedication to the sport,” he says.

“If I wasn’t already 100 per cent committed before the Olympics, afterwards I absolutely was because at the start of year I was ranked 40th, I finished the year ranked 13th.

“I just think I am on the way and I want to try and summit Everest.”

Browning captured the attention of a nation at the Tokyo Olympics. Picture: Matthias Hangst/Getty Images

And he’s now set on breaking the 10-second barrier. Picture: John Feder/The Australian.

The Sydney law student knows to be a legitimate contender on the world stage he has to break 10-seconds and become just the second Australian in history to do it.

“I keep getting asked, ‘When is it going to happen? When is it going to happen?’,” he says. “First of all you never say it is going to happen because you just never know.

“But I know there are areas of my race that I have significant room to improve on so if I put it all together I am definitely capable of running sub-10, I just have to go and do it and hopefully this year is the year.

“Sub-10 doesn’t mean much on its own but once you go sub-10 it just sort of helps the next phase of your career, it’s like once you have done you then have to do it regularly to really be a contender and show you have the capacity to run that quick otherwise you’re not even in the mix.

“I have been patient with it, we are working on a few things and I know from all the data that I have done with my biomechanist and my coach (Andrew Murphy), the first 10 metres of my race is where I win or lose it.

“Or should I say that’s not where I win it but it’s where I lose it so we have been working a lot on that, just fixing my blocks and making them more consistent. It is more about consistency at the end of the day.”

After running a 10.01sec in the heat, Browning held his own in 100m semi-final. Picture: Alex Coppel.

There will be plenty of opportunities for the 24-year-old with an unprecedented three major championships on his plate, starting with the world indoors in Belgrade, Serbia next month. The world championships are then in Eugene, Oregon in July, with the Commonwealth Games in Birmingham a week later.

“These opportunities have come at a good time for me as I’m in good shape and just understanding the event so much better,” Browning says.

“There were a lot of technical things in the lead-up to the Olympics and that takes time to change, you have to break old habits and then forge some new ones. I’m now starting to see the benefit of that in training and I think that will keep developing this year and beyond.”

His trademark mullet hairstyle was a major talking point during Tokyo and while it remains in place, it hasn’t been allowed to get out of control.

“There are better mullets out there, a lot better than mine. I might keep it, we’ll just see, everything is on the table.”

Originally published as Adelaide Track Classic live stream: Australia’s fastest man Rohan Browning and his quest to break magical 10-second barrier