Joseph Deng smashes 50-year-old Australian 800m record at the Diamond League athletics

FORMER refugee Joseph Deng has smashed the 50-year-old Australian 800m record at the Diamond League athletics meet in Monaco.

FIVE months ago Joseph Deng was a controversial Commonwealth Games selection bolter, now the former refugee is the fastest 800m runner in Australian history.

The incredible journey of Deng, 20, reached its pinnacle at the Monaco Diamond League meet overnight when he smashed the 50-year-old 800m record by clocking 1min44.21sec.

Olympic gold medallist Ralph Doubell had set the previous Australian mark of 1:44.40sec at altitude at the 1968 Mexico City Games. It was then equalled by Alex Rowe in Monaco four years ago.

Joseph Deng is the fastest 800m runner in Australian history. Picture: Adam Head

Deng, who is trained by Rowe’s coach Justin Rinaldi, finished seventh in a hot race which was won in a world leading time by Botswana’s Nijel Amos (1min42.14sec).

“It’s a great feeling,” said Deng. “My target coming into the race wasn’t the record, it was just to run fast.

“I knew it was going to be a fast race. (Coach Rinaldi) said to stick in the top five, top six position and see what happens.

“This is my last race of the season, so I’m done now. I’m back in Australia next week.”

Deng arrived in Australia as a six-year-old having fled war-torn Sudan. Picture: Getty

Deng was born in a Kenyan refugee camp in 1998 after his mother, Rebecca, fled the brutal civil war in Sudan. He doesn’t know his father.

The family arrived in Queensland in 2004, settling initially in Toowoomba before Deng attended Ipswich Grammar School where his athletic ability was first recognised.

He moved to Melbourne at the end of 2016 to team up with Rinaldi with the aim of making the Gold Coast Commonwealth Games team.

That almost didn’t eventuate after the teenager missed a spot in the 800m final at the February selection trials. He then raced in the B-final, clocking a personal best time of 1:45.71sec which captured the eye of the Australian team selectors.

Deng has been on the radar of Australian athletics officials for years. Picture: Jono Searle.

They then went with Deng ahead of three-time Olympican Jeff Riseley as the discretionary third runner on the basis of his potential looking ahead to the 2020 Tokyo Olympics.

The teenager didn’t let them down, making the Commonwealth Games final where he finished seventh.

Deng and his training partner Peter Bol - another Australian middle-distance runner of Sudanese descent - have been chasing the 800m record throughout the European season. Bol finished ninth in 1:46.64sec in Monaco.

While Doubell’s name is no longer in the record books, another performance from the Mexico City Games, silver medallist Peter Norman’s 200m record of 20.06sec, is now the oldest.

The most durable women’s mark is Charlene Rendina’s 800m time of 1:59.0 which dates back to 1976.

Deng also broke the Oceania 800m record of 1:44.3 set by New Zealander Peter Snell way back in 1962.

The highlight of the Monaco meet was Kenya’s Beatrice Chepkoech obliterating the world record in the women’s 3,000 metres steeplechase by more than eight seconds.

Already the fastest in the world this year, Chepkoech, 27, won in a time of 8min44.32 seconds to break the previous record mark of 8min52.78sec set by Bahrain’s Ruth Jebet in 2016.