31.03.2010

Ten touted for inaugural Youth Olympic Games

Athletics Australia has today announced that 10 athletes will be nominated to the Australian Olympic Committee for inclusion in the team that will represent Australia at the inaugural Youth Olympic Games in Singapore in August.

The first-ever Australian Youth Olympic Games team will be led by 2009 world youth championships representatives Kurt Jenner (long jump) and Damien Birkinhead (shot put), and feature eight athletes on their international debut.

Pole vault prodigy Elizabeth Parnov will lead the Australian girls’ charge, the 15-year-old Western Australian athlete nominated for the team with two Commonwealth Games A-qualifying performances to her name.

In an outstanding start to 2010 the daughter of pole vault guru Alex Parnov – coach of world, Olympic, world indoor and Commonwealth Games champion Steve Hooker – has twice equalled the Commonwealth Games A-standard, clearing 4.30m at meets in Perth and Sydney last month to stake her claim for a ticket to New Delhi, India, in October.

All 10 athletes nominated for selection to the team will travel to Singapore as national underage champions in their respective Youth Olympic Games events after taking home national crowns from the Australian Junior Athletics Championships in Sydney this month.

Jenner, Birkinhead and Parnov will be joined in the Lion City by fellow national Under 18 champions Nicholas Hough (110m hurdles), Brodie Cross (pole vault), Blake Steele (10,000m walk), Jenny Blundell (1000m), Michelle Jenneke (100m hurdles), Demii Maher-Smith (long jump) and Prabhjot Rai (shot put) for 12 days of hard-fought competition from August 14 to 26.

For the 10 athletes selected to the Australian team, the Youth Olympic Games will serve as a launch pad to next year’s IAAF world youth championships and onwards to the IAAF world junior championships in 2012.

The all-new Youth Olympic Games aims to inspire youth around the world to embrace, embody and express the Olympic values of excellence, friendship and respect and will see some 5,000 athletes aged between 14 and 18 years compete in 26 sports across 12 days of international action.

In what is building as a bumper year for developing Australian talent, 48 track and field athletes will this year represent their country on the world stage following the selection of 38 athletes to the world junior championships team that will travel to Moncton, Canada, in July for the 13th edition of the world junior titles.

This year’s world junior championships and inaugural Youth Olympic Games will follow on from Australia’s most successful world championships and world indoor championships campaigns of all time, the former reaping four medals (two gold, two bronze) in Berlin (GER) last August and this month’s world indoor titles adding a further three medals (two gold, one bronze) to the nation’s all-time tally in Doha, Qatar.

Youth Olympic Games
August 14-26, 2010
Singapore (SIN)

Boys (5):
110m hurdles: Nicholas Hough (16, NSW)
Pole vault: Brodie Cross (15, Vic)
Long jump: Kurt Jenner (16, NSW)
Shot put: Damien Birkinhead (16, Vic)
10,000m walk: Blake Steele (17, SA)

Girls (5):
1000m: Jenny Blundell (15, NSW)
100m hurdles: Michelle Jenneke (16, NSW)
Pole vault: Elizabeth Parnov (15, WA)
Long jump: Demii Maher-Smith (15, Qld)
Shot put: Prabhjot Rai (17, Vic)