Marjorie Jackson, who celebrated her 90th birthday on 13 September, was Australia’s first athletics superstar.
Our first women’s Olympic gold medallist, our first women’s world record holder, Jackson surged to international recognition with a double in the 100 and 200 metres at the Helsinki 1952 Olympic Games. She would have...
The men’s 1500 metres was one of the two most anticipated races at the just-concluded national championships in Adelaide (the other, the women’s 800).
New York offers one of the strongest women’s fields ever assembled.
But that was before the whole sport was hit by a missile with the news that Peter Bol had returned an “AAF (adverse analytical finding) for Erythropoietin Receptor Agonists (ERA): rEPO (rEPO).” Synthetic EPO, in other words, which is a proscribed substance.
Hassan closes with deadly speed
After Herb Elliott had destroyed Ron Delany and the rest of the field to smash the world mile record in Dublin in 1958, a priest asked Delany how would you beat the great Australian.
“I don’t know, father,” replied Delany. “Maybe tie his legs together.”
Sifan Hassan...
The runaway train that is the Change Express continues to cut a swathe through the athletics world.
Having shunted race walking into a siding last time out, the train careered on in the direction of the Diamond League. Perhaps not surprisingly given the locomotive’s near-warp speed, the major casualty on...
By Len Johnson - Runner's Tribe
I went bush walking this week. Nothing epic: a couple of nights’ camping in Victoria’s Grampians and walks to Mt Sturgeon and Mt Abrupt, and along the Wannon River to fill in the days.
Until...
If you were seeking signs that the sporting world is getting back to pre-Covid normality, best you didn’t go looking for them at the World Athletics Relays.
We are still in the thank-heavens-there’s-something-on phase, it would seem, rather than back in full swing. Maybe the Tokyo Olympics will change that;...
When Jessica Hull ran 8:36.03 to set a new Australian women’s record for 3000 metres last September, it was widely – and correctly – reported that she had broken Benita Willis’s previous mark set over 17 years earlier in 2003.
Willis, in turn, had run 8:38.06 to finally better the...
From Rabat to Kampala
A Colum By Len Johnson - Runner's Tribe
This Sunday, the Australian teams to contest the world cross-country championships leave for Kampala. It is just on 42 years since Australia first contested the event in Rabat, Morocco, on 16 March, 1975.
Now, 42 might seem a strange anniversary...
