Sprinter Nana Owusu-Afriyie remembers the moment her life changed forever after attending her first ever Coles Little Athletics clinic.
“I started in athletics through my PE teacher. I won a couple of House athletics titles at school and he said to me that I should join a Little Athletics club,” she said.
“I started at 11, my parents took me to a come and try day, and I remember breaking the 70m record on that first day.
“I laugh about it now, I didn’t know athletics had special shoes like waffles or spikes, I just had my Converses and ran with those.”
Things soon changed, and Nana’s parents took her to the local shoe shop and she got a pair of spikes and the rest is history.
Now a Little Athletics Australia ambassador, Nana is getting behind a clinic that will be held at the Newport Park Athletics Track in Melbourne on the weekend, very similar to the one she went to all those years ago when she was 11.
The event is part of World Athletics Kid’s Day 2026, and comes after the Australian Athletics and Little Athletics Australia unified earlier in the year.
The event will celebrate five years of World Athletics Kid’s Day, and Nana will be in attendance cheering the future little athletes on.
Those little athletes might have a similar story to tell in years to come much like Nana, who has run for Australia.
She also hopes they make life long friends, from competing in athletics.
“There is so much joy from meeting different people, interacting with people you may never interact with,” she said.
“I found my best friend Celeste Mucci at Little Athletics.
“We went to an open day together and we used to do high jump,she became an Australian heptathlete.
“We didn’t choose the same event, but I got to meet someone I’m still friends with 15 years later.”
By Luke Dennehy, Australian Athletics
Posted 8/5/2026
