Mitchell Watt long jumping in Canberra on 30 January 2010 (© Getty Images)
Domestically and internationally, Mitchell Watt was one of the biggest movers of 2009. After mucking around with the Long Jump for a few years, he got serious to such an extent that he came within a finger’s length of breaking Sydney 2000 Olympic silver medallist Jai Taurima’s national Long Jump record and then produced a bronze-medal winning jump at the World Championships in Berlin.
On a warm, sunny Canberra Saturday afternoon (30), Watt was both the biggest name and the best performer at the Australia Cup meeting, the first of a revamped Australian Athletics Tour. Watt only got his approach right the once, but that was enough for a legal 8.13m jump and a comfortable win over Chris Noffke (7.75).
Watt had a first-round foul, produced the winning effort on his second jump, then went run-through (measured at 3.46), foul, foul, and run-through (3.11). The series was uncannily reminiscent of his performance in Berlin (8.28, x, x, x, 8.37, x) but, as on that occasion, it may have been ugly, but it did the job. And Watt believes competition will iron out the kinks.
“It feels like it’s been a long time, I’ve been training well but you can’t really replicate a competition environment in training that well so the only way I’m going to jump further is just to keep competing,” Watt said. With the World Indoor championships, the IAAF Diamond League and the Commonwealth Games all on his 2010 plate, he will be doing just that.
Offereins’ 45.32sec PB
Like Watt, Ben Offereins is another athlete who has experienced a delay in realising his potential. A national champion at 19 in 2005, he drifted and his performances suffered accordingly. Then he was injured in a road accident. In the last year, Offereins has got things back on course. A personal best 45.69sec run secured him the last spot in the Berlin 4x400m relay squad; then he produced a storming run for the quartet which took the bronze medal.
With the announcement during the week that Beijing individual bronze medallist David Neville would be running in Sydney (27 February) and in the IAAF World Challenge Meeting in Melbourne (4 March), the men’s 400m is set to be the glamour event of the Australian season. With a personal best of 45.32 in Canberra, Offereins sent a message to domestic rivals John Steffensen and Sean Wroe (neither of whom ran) and Joel Milburn (3rd in 46.63) that he intends to challenge for the lead role.
Seven other Australian juniors won senior titles in the same year as Offereins made his initial breakthrough. Two - 2009 World Discus Throw champion Dani Samuels and 2008 Beijing Olympic 100m Hurdles silver medallist Sally McLellan - have already gone on to make an impact internationally. Offereins could be the third.
Lewis pressed hard
Lachlan Renshaw was another young title winner that year in the 800 metres. Last year he was a World University Games finalist and improved his personal best to 1:45.73 in Leverkusen, despite not making the team for Berlin. In Canberra, he added an impressive 52-second closing lap to a pedestrian 56-high opener to win in 1:49.18. In second place, Alex Rowe, fifth in the World Youth Championships final last year, took several senior scalps.
Tamsyn Lewis is used to winning in Australia. The World Indoor champion at 800 metres is not often challenged at 400 or 800, but in Canberra she had to produce an outstanding finish to edge past Jody Henry to take the 400, 52.41 to 52.44. The latter was a significant personal best for Henry, a member of Australia’s relay squad in Berlin.
Lewis is in transition to the 400m Hurdles, but she skipped that event in Canberra. Lauren Boden, another of the 2005 junior class of senior national champions, looked to have plenty in reserve in winning in 56.48.
There was an upset in the women’s 100m. Melissa Breen narrowly missing selection for Berlin last year and has run wind-aided times of 11.22 and 11.44 in Canberra already this year, but this day she could not hold off 22-year-old Laura Whaler who edged out the favourite, 11.71 to 11.74 into a 2.6 metres per second headwind.
Whaler finished eighth in last year’s national final (in which Breen was second to McLellan) and sixth the year before. Coached by Tony Fairweather, who guided Joshua Ross through his major career achievements, she is a member of the indigenous Jump Start to London 2012 programme.
Dual Olympic Race Walks medallist Jared Tallent tuned-up for the opening event in the IAAF Race Walking Challenge series (the Australian 20km championship in Hobart on 13 February), with a 19:08.81 win in a men’s 5000 metres track walk.
Tallent finished almost 45 seconds clear of Australian teammate Adam Rutter, with Mexican duo David Mejia and Adrian Herrera and Sweden’s Ato Ibez close behind.
In the field, New Zealand’s Stuart Farquhar won the Javelin with a throw of 81.11 metres. Farquhar, who set his personal best 83.23 in Canberra some years back, had one other 81-metre throw and two over 79 metres.
Len Johnson for the IAAF
