Browning, Patterson, upstaged by teens and potential Olympians Torrie Lewis and Cameron Myers
Track star Rohan Browning warmed up for the national titles with a win, but he and the rest of a high-class field were upstaged by a pair of rising stars with the Paris Olympics in their sights.
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A slimmed-down and less hirsute Rohan Browning warmed up for the national titles with a win at the Sydney Track Classic on Saturday night, but he and the rest of a high-class field were upstaged by a pair of rising stars with Paris in their sights.
Browning strolled to victory in the 100 metres at ES Marks Field in a time of 10.29sec, well off the Olympic qualifying standard as he insisted his priority was on peaking for the national titles to be held in Adelaide in three weeks.
The Tokyo Olympian, who has shaved off his famous mullet, has tinkered with his diet and experimented with his starts in a bid to become more consistent, conceding the latter remains a work in progress.
“That start - I just haven’t worked it out,” Browning said.
“It has probably been an 18-month process where I have been trialing different things and none of them have really stuck yet.
“I am a lot fitter, lighter. I think that impetus from being in a championship - the (national) trials - will really lift me up.
“I think my previous (starting) model was inconsistent. There were times when I was having a really good start but I was rolling the dice every time.
“And consistency really is the most important thing in this event because it is a precision event. The Australian circuit is so early in the year so it is about being in shape for the trials.
“Week to week you deviate and fluctuate in form. It is just about putting it together when it counts - and then in Paris.”
Browning has also been working with his dietitian in a bid to avoid illnesses that have plagued him in recent years.
“It is something I have worked on with my dietitian,” Browning said.
“I used to miss two to three weeks a of training just from getting sick - cold, covid, whatever. I have hardly been sick in the past year.”
Browning’ still has plenty of work to do to qualify for Paris and while his fellow Tokyo Olympian Eleanor Patterson is considered a more certain selection, her return competition on home soil after a two year absence didn’t quite go to plan.
Patterson’s run-up in the high jump was affected by the restricted space at ES Marks Field and she struggled to find her rhythm, securing gold with a mark well short of her personal best.
“Not the result or competition I was after at all,” Patterson said after clearing 1.88m.
“Ultimately I had a lot more trouble with not fitting my run-up in than I had anticipated. This is what happens - you come across competitions where you can’t fit in your run up and you have to be able to handle it.
“Unfortunately today it threw my rhyme quite a lot and obviously rhythm is integral to my sport. I had to make sure of what I had on the day and unfortunately 1.88m is not (great).
“That is purely on me - I didn’t handle that.”
While Browning and Patterson struggled to replicate their best form, teenagers Torrie Lewis and Cameron Myers continued their rapid ascent through the athletic ranks with a pair of eye-catching performances.
Lewis anchored the women’s sprint relay as they set a new national record, securing a spot in the world relay championship and taking another step towards Paris selection.
Myers, the 17-year-old prodigy who last year became the second youngest person to run a sub-four minute mile, won the first senior title of his career as he set a new personal best in the 3000 metres.
Myers has been hailed as the future of middle distance running in this country and his performance did little to suggest otherwise as he beat his more seasoned opponents in a time of 7:46.38.
The teenager plans to run an 800 metres at Bankstown later this week before focusing on the 1,500m at the national championships.
Asked about winning his first major medal, Myers said: “It is pretty good but I would much rather get one at the trials in a couple of weeks.
“This is just sort of a stepping stone and it is positive momentum. So I am happy about that. I am happy to be in shape and it is more confirmation that I am ready to race.
“I look at it like I have to be at my best and if I am at my best, I am going to be pretty hard to beat.”
In other results, Jessica Hull signed off on the 3,000 metres with a win as she prepares to focus on the 1,500m and 5,000m at the nationals.
LEWIS CONTINUES HOT STREAK
Sprint sensation Torrie Lewis continued her hot streak after setting another national record at the Sydney Track Classic on Saturday night, this time as part of the women’s 4 x 100 metre relay team.
Lewis joined Ella Connolly, Bree Masters and Ebony Lane in smashing a record that has stood for more than 20 years, anchoring the team as they crossed the line in a time of 42.94sec.
The previous record was set by Rachael Massey, Suzanne Broadrick, Jody Lambert and Melinda Gainsford-Taylor in South Africa in 2000.
Lewis, 19, set a new national record for the 100m earlier this year when she flashed home in 11.10sec at the Canberra Track Classic.
She opted to sit out the 100m last night, instead focusing on the relay. It turned out to be a smart move as the quartet now qualified for the world relays in the Bahamas later this year, where they will have the chance to secure a spot at the Paris Olympics.
“The women that had it were pretty amazing too so to get the record from them is pretty special too,” Lewis said.
Earlier in the night, comeback queen Liz Clay stepped up her return from a broken foot when she won a cliffhanger in the 100m hurdle over national champion Michelle Jenneke.
Clay and Jenneke were neck-and-neck for most of the race and it took several minutes for judges to separate the pair, with Clay eventually adjudged to have won by .003sec.
Clay broke her foot competing nearly two years ago but she has now broken the 13-second barrier in successive races as she targets the national titles next month.
“We have done a lot of work since breaking my foot on actually changing some things to prevent falls - I am not as wild,” Clay said.
“I decided I was going to absolutely go for it. It was great with Michelle - you could see us after the race and we were smiling at each other.”
PREVIEW: PATTERSON’S SIGHTS HIGH IN HOME RETURN
World champion high jumper Eleanor Patterson hasn’t competed on home soil for more than two years and she wants to mark her return at the Sydney Track Classic on Saturday night with something special.
If that means clearing two metres, she will give it a shot.
“My body has conspired against me essentially as to why I have not competed in Australia for a couple of years,” Patterson said.
“I have opted to do small portions of the European indoor seasons, which was when domestic season was on, but then I would often come back and I bruised a heel one year. Last year I broke my foot.
“It has been over two years since I competed and I think it was a rainy Canberra in January or 2022. I jumped really badly.
“It means a lot. I am a huge fan of athletics and I love it dearly, I would love Australians to love it as much as I do. So it is nice to be able to compete at home and bring what we do to an atmosphere like this.
“I have done it on the world stage a lot and I just haven’t done it in Australia for a long time, showcasing what we do as athletes and bringing it here.”
Patterson headlines a quality field at the Sydney Track Classic in one of the final warm-up events before the all-important national championships next month, where qualifying for the Paris Olympics will ramp up a notch.
She has barely competed this year - she has only entered two events overseas - which only makes Saturday night at ES Marks Field more important to her Olympic preparations.
“I would say my competitions - I have just done two (this year) - haven’t shown what sort of shape I am in,” Patterson said.
“I feel like it is a matter of time before I bring that to fruition. It has been a really big preseason for me. I am feeling very strong, very fit and very ready.
“I think I can jump quite high. I don’t necessarily know what number. I am kind of going into it wth the expectations of enjoy each moment, enjoy being in front of a home crowd.”
If she can give them a moment to savour, she will. There is every chance she will set the bar to two metres or more - the holy grail in women’s high jump - and look to match the leap she made to win the world championships in 2022.
On that occasion, she cleared 2.02m.
“I always like to see what I can do,” she said.
“It feels like I haven’t jumped two metres in a hot minute. I have got 1.99m and it is rude. I think the more times you jump that perceived barrier of two metres, the greater confidence you can take from it.
“It’s great to get the chance to do it more often.”
Meanwhile, sprint sensation Torrie Lewis will take part in the relay in Sydney as she looks for the .03 seconds she needs to secure a qualifying time for Paris.
Lewis became Australia’s fastest-ever woman in January when she ran 11.10 seconds in Canberra, but she is still a heartbeat off the qualifying time for Paris.
“It is literally like a snap of your fingers,” Lewis said.
“It is definitely hard to get there again even though it is pretty close. Everything came together for me in Canberra. Ever since then we have been running into headwinds or not the greatest conditions.”
Hurdler Jacob McCorry is in the same boat, although he is targeting ranking points as his path to the games. After the national titles, he plans to head to Japan to compete and bump up his ranking.
“We’re probably across the board we’re in one of the fastest - if not the fastest period of men’s hurdles - ever,” McCorry said.
“It will be fast.”
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