28.01.2008

Australia Day weekend delivers performances, promise

Sally McLellan’s scorching hurdles victory in Canberra, Craig Mottram’s stunning indoor 3000m record in the USA and Steve Hooker’s six-metre leap were the big stories of a fruitful Australia Day weekend.

The Canberra Athletics Classic turned up the heat on what will be a loaded month of domestic action with the Australian Athletics Cup (February 2), Sydney Grand Prix (February 16), Melbourne Grand Prix (February 21) and Selection Trials and 86th Australian Championships (February 28 - March 1) to come.

McLellan (100m hurdles) and Jarrod Bannister (javelin) produced A-qualifiers in the capital, while solid performances from Tamsyn Lewis, Madeleine Pape and Lachlan Renshaw (800m), Ellen Pettitt (high jump), Jared Tallent (20km walk) and the men’s 4 x 400m relay teams highlighted the weekend.

A successful season debut for Bronwyn Thompson (long jump) and a return to Canberra for perennial sprint favourites Matt Shirvington and Lauren Hewitt were also popular with the spectators.

Sally celebrates Australia Day
Tallent wins, 400 relays burn in Canberra
Hewitt continues welcome return
Shirvington sees bronze, silver, maybe gold lining
Thompson hits the board

Undoubtedly the biggest result of the weekend came in Boston as Craig Mottram navigated the track in personal best time and the fastest seen in the USA.

The 7:34.50 run was nearly five seconds quicker than his 2007 effort and broke the US all-comers mark held by the great Haile Gebrselassie.

Mottram fastest on US soil

Back across the Pacific, Australian pole vault champion Steve Hooker joined the six-metre club in Perth - scaling the height in interclub competition to move towards putting his World Championships disappointment behind him.

Hooker hits the heights

And Kurt Fearnley, arguably the world’s leading wheelchair athlete, opened his 2008 account with victory in the Oz Day 10km in Sydney.

Fearnley takes fourth straight Oz Day