Australia’s track and field athletes have certainly been producing on the world stage in recent years. The four medals (1 gold, 2 silver, 1 bronze) at the 2008 Beijing Olympics were backed up with a record 2 gold and 2 bronze at the 2009 World Championships.

The future continues to look bright, with the Australian Olympic Committee today confirming the selection of 10 outstanding athletes for the first Youth Olympic Games to be held in Singapore in August.

The five boys and five girls nominated by Athletics Australia are all under-18 national champions in their events and have demonstrated great form and champion qualities this season.

Pole vault prodigy Liz Parnov will lead the Australian athletics charge in Singapore and later in the year she will also compete at the Commonwealth Games in India. The 16-year-old won the National Open title with a personal best of 4.40m in April.

Parnov comes from amazing pole vaulting pedigree and is surrounded by it everyday. She is the daughter of Alex who himself was an outstanding jumper and now better known as the coach of world, Olympic, world indoor and Commonwealth Games champion Steve Hooker.

Her older sister Vicky is also an Australian pole vaulter, her aunt is Olympic silver medallist Tatiana Grigorieva and her grandmother is Natalya Pechonkina who won Olympic bronze for the USSR in the women's 400m at the 1968 Games. She and her family moved from Russia to Australia in 1996.

Another standout for the girls is Jenny Blundell who will contest the 1000m. The 16-year-old from Sydney was less than two seconds off Olympian Georgie Clarke’s under-18 national record (2:43.72) at the trial - her first race over this distance. When Clarke ran the record it was three months before making the Sydney Olympic semi-finals.

Blundell and her coach Valme Kruger think the record is possible in August.

“My PB is 2:45.67 and in Singapore I’m really hoping to get as close as I can to the 2:40 mark and I think with that time I could possibly medal,” Blundell explained.

“I’m really excited to be going to Singapore. It’s going to be really interesting to see how athletes from all around the world approach their competition and how their everyday lives differ from ours here in Australia.”

In an impressive achievement for the Cherrybrook Athletics Club, Blundell will be joined in Singapore by teammate Michelle Jenneke who has been selected in the 100m hurdles.

Queensland long jumper Demii Maher-Smith (15) and shot putter Prabhjot Rai (17) round-out the girls.
2009 Australian Youth Olympic Festival champions Kurt Jenner (long jump, 16) and Damien Birkinhead (shot put, 17), will lead the boys.

Birkenhead has thrown over 21 metres this year to claim the under-18 national record and Jenner has jumped 7.40m. Jenner hopes to challenge for a medal in Singapore and use this event as a stepping stone to the Olympic Games.

Jenner’s plans for Singapore are, “Firstly to qualify for the final, jump a PB in the final and then really go for a medal - hopefully win it.”

From Singapore 2010 Jenner has the 2012 World Junior Championships (under-20), maybe the London Olympics and definitely the 2016 Olympic Games in Rio de Janeiro as his plan for the future.

The Australian Olympic Committee will be sending the maximum 100 athletes comprising 70 individual athletes and 30 from team sports to compete across over 20 summer sports at the Youth Olympic Games.

There will be 340 boys and 340 girls competing in athletics at the Bishan Stadium in Singapore, from 17-23 August.

There is a limit of one athlete per country per event. Each athlete can compete in one individual event and the continental medley relay if required.

Andrew Reid
AOC