Athletics Australia – News – CYG11: Four medals provide ideal start for Australia

Four medals, including two gold, on day one on the Isle of Man have seen the Australian track and field team begin their Commonwealth Youth Games campaign with a bang.

Standing atop the dais were Taylah Sengul in the girl’s discus throw and Angus Gould in the boy’s long jump.

Sengul with her opening throw of 50.71m sent a commanding message to the field to take an early lead that she would never relinquish. Backing up her fantastic opening round throw with 48.83m, 50.61m and three consecutive fouls, Sengul will head into the girl’s shot put today full of confidence.

“I wanted to get a good throw out early to put some pressure on the other girls and thankfully I was able to make it happen,” Sengul said.

“For that throw to be a personal best though was amazing, and to then see that become enough to win gold is just fantastic.”

Gould in the long jump, meanwhile, soared a wind assisted personal best of 7.53m to win his Commonwealth Youth title. Opening his account with 7.11m, Gould backed up with 7.27m, 7.33m and 7.45m. He leapt his winning distance in the penultimate round before closing with 7.45m.

“I came into the Games just wanting to jump a personal best and would have been happy with that to be honest,” Gould said.

“Things got a little interesting with the Englishman Elliot Sato jumped 7.40m to challenge me midway through but I tried to ignore it and stay focused – I knew I could jump further.”

On track, Sophie Lin won a silver medal in the women’s 1500m, while Josh Clarke crossed the line third for bronze in the men’s 100m.

Clocking 4:45.53, Lin was edged out for the gold medal by Ffion Price (4:44.13) of Wales.

“I would have liked the race to be faster but it was so windy that no one wanted to take the lead and take on the tough conditions,” Lin said.

“I was so surprised to win the silver medal, I knew that I would perform well here but to head home with something as great as this to show for it is really exciting.”

Clarke clocked a wind assisted personal best of 10.53 (+2.8) to finish on the podium behind Tahir Walsh (ANT, 10.50, gold) and Chijindu Ujah (ENG, 10.52, gold).

Winning his heat in 10.60 (+1.4) to advance, Clarke also won his semi-final in a time of 10.58 (+2.5).

“I’m just really happy about running a new personal best. The wind meant most of the times were illegal but my heat time of 10.60 was only with a +1.4 wind,” Clarke said.

“In the final I didn’t get a great start and the other two guys got fliers. I had to work hard to get back up with them and it was so close in the end with only 003 seconds separating the first three places.”

In other Australian results:

–       Kate Spencer crossed the line fourth (6:55:05) in the women’s 2000m steeplechase, with the gold medal won by Kenyan Tanui Jeruto in 6:28.10.

–       Gould was joined by Jake Grevsmuhl in the men’s long jump final, who finished 4^th after soaring 6.97m (+3.3)

–       Sophie Taylor clocked 12.15 (+2.4) to finish 5^th in the women’s 100m final.

–       Max Waldron won his 400m semi-final in 48.84 to advance to the final today, while Alexandra Bulic in the women’s event clocked 1:00.85. She was unable to move into the final

The Australian track and field team now sits atop the medal tally after day one with two gold, one silver and one bronze.

Competition continues today, with live results available here.

For to the minute updates from the Isle of Man, stay tuned to @AthsAust on Twitter.

 

Athletics Australia – News