Athletics Australia – News – Foote & Sims win gold at Australian Combined Events Champs

The Western Australian Athletics Stadium played host to the Australian Combined Event Championships late last week, as Jarrod Sims and Lauren Foote took home the gold in the men’s decathlon and women’s heptathlon respectively.

Heading home after day one with the lead, South Australian Sims maintained his position to win with a total of 7500 points ahead of silver medallist Stephen Cain (VIC, 6863 points) and Matthew Harris (NSW, 6722 points), who won bronze.

The winner of the 100m (11.02, w: +0.6) and 400m (49.07), Sims was thrilled to once again lay claim to the national championship.

“It’s a pretty good feeling to be national champion, I feel like it has been a long time coming and to have the medal is a blast,” Sims said.

“I had a couple of years off but am coming back pretty strong, this results is about 200 from a PB and that’s a reassuring sign.

“The weather here in Perth in awesome and I’ve been impressed by the setup of this meet, a later start has worked well for me.”

Foote, a former world junior championships representative, today added a third national crown to her burgeoning trophy cabinet after taking victory with 5539 points.

Joined on the podium by Victorian Ashleigh Hamilton (second, 5061 points) and Lauren Bale (third, 4967 points) of Queensland, Foote couldn’t be happier with her dominant victory.

“You can’t complain about a national championship,” Foote said.

“My results were a bit up and down, but to come away with a strong win is a real plus and I am excited to compete at a new track in SA in a couple of weeks.

“And Jarrod (Sims) has won gold too so it’s a great day for South Australia.”

Meanwhile in the under 20 age group Kyle Cranston (NSW, 7189 points) reigned supreme in the decathlon, with local favourite Loughlyn Webb of Western Australia scoring 4509 points to win the women’s heptathlon in front of her home crowd.

Doubling as the selection trial for the IAAF world youth championships later this year, the under 18 combined events saw New South Welshman Jake Stein set a new Australian record of 7427 points to book his ticket to the Lille-hosted event.

His second world youth qualifying performance, Stein will now begin a solid training block ahead of his first appearance in the green and gold in July.

“It’s just unreal, I am stoked that it came together in Perth and that I carried my form through to the last event with a good 1500m time” Stein said

“With France in mind I’ll shift my attention to some serious training now, prepare as well as I can and fingers crossed once I get to world youths I can medal and maybe even improve on my new record.”

 Stein was joined on the podium by Jake Grevsmuh (QLD, second, 6862 points) and David Brock (VIC, third, 6861 points), whilst the girl’s under 18 heptathlon was won by Melissa-Maree Farrington in a world youth championships qualifying performance of 5218 points.

To download and view full results from the Australian Combined Events Championships, please click here.

 

Athletics Australia – News