Six track and field athletes will compete in finals on Saturday with four chasing medals, including Australian Team Flag Bearer Liz Parnov.

Parnov who qualified in the hot and sweaty conditions with a big third and final clearance at 3.90 metres on Tuesday will need to jump close to her personal best of 4.40m to challenge for the gold.

Angelic Bengtsson of Sweden is the top ranked athlete in the field. Her season best is 4.47 metres and there are another two girls who have cleared over 4.20m.

In Europe before arriving in Singapore the 16-year-old from Perth jumped 4.15 metres in tough conditions.

The pole vault competition will commence at 7.15 pm (local time) and the Australian Open Champion intends to join the competition when the bar is raised to 3.90m, as she did in qualifying.

Michelle Jenneke will be the first Australian in finals action. The 100m hurdler was ‘beaming’ after running a personal best of 13.65 seconds in her heat on Tuesday and thinks there is more improvement left for Saturday morning’s final at 9.35am.

“I definitely think I can go faster in the final,” the 17-year-old who runs for Cherrybrook Athletics Club in Sydney said.

“I’ve looked at the tape of my race with my coach and there are a few things I can improve on.”

She has drawn lucky lane six for the final. Russian Ekaterina Bleskina who ran 13.35s to beat Jenneke in heat 3 on Tuesday is the favourite for gold but on paper the racing for the minor medals will be extremely tight.

Jenneke has a huge support base cheering her on here in Singapore. Her grandma, grandpa, mum, dad, sister, uncle, aunt, coach and coaches girlfriend have all travelled from Australia.

Fellow Sydney hurdler Nicholas Hough has also drawn lane six for the biggest race of his career to date. The Kings Year 11 student had a strong heat win on Tuesday and was the fastest qualifier for Saturday night’s final at 7.55pm.

“I’m pretty excited about the final and I’m not as nervous as I was for the heat,” Hough, who occasionally busks at Circular Quay, said.

“I definitely need to improve on my start from the heat. I’m going to try and get out well and be the top one or two after the first two hurdles. Hopefully I’ll pull away from them instead of chasing.”

After watching replays of the other heats back in the Village Hough has a good idea of what form his competitors are in and what time it will take to get amongst the medals.

“I think you’ll need to be in the 13.30s for the medals. There were a couple of guys cruising in the other heats. I ran 13.50 in my heat and that wasn’t perfect and my PB is 13.40. I know I can go faster than that so I believe I can do it.”

While Parnov is jumping at one end of Bishan Stadium Brandon Starc will be high jumping at the other.

“I’m excited and a little bit of nerves are coming on,” Starc, who equalled his personal best of 2.10m in qualifying said.

“The first aim is to jump a PB and anything else is a bonus. Hopefully I’ll get into the medals but I’ll need to wait and see. I would say it will take a jump of 2.14m or 2.15 to podium.”

The statistics show that Israel’s Dmitry Kroytor with a personal and season best of 2.24m should win but he didn’t look overly impressive in qualifying. With all these athletes inexperienced with big meet pressure upsets are expected.

This is Starc’s first international meet but he has the benefit of having his personal coach Alex Stewart on the coaching staff for the Australian Team here in Singapore.

Demii Maher-Smith and Luke Greco round out the Australians competing on Saturday. Both of them are determined to improve on their qualifying performances.

Greco will race in the C Final of the 400m at 9.50am and Maher-Smith the long jump B final at 7.10pm.

The Victorian sprinter ran 50.83 in Tuesday’s heat and will be looking to get down closer to his personal best of 49.13 and take out the C Final.

Maher-Smith who has had a limited preparation due to injury and in her first big meet jumped well in qualifying (5.67m). She is confident she can also get near her personal best of 5.90m with her remaining four jumps of the Games. 

Andrew Reid
AOC