CHAMPION SPRINTER FIGHTS BACK AFTER MAJOR INJURY
Local sprint champion, Riley Day, is continuing to take major strides towards winning selection in the Australia team to compete in the 2024 Paris Olympics.
The former Beaudesert Little Athletics star missed almost the entire domestic season with a back stress fracture, but showed she is coming back to her best with a strong third placing in the recent Oceania International meet in Fiji.
Day finished in a time of 23.63 in Suva behind fellow Aussies Torrie Lewis and Mia Goss.
The 24 year-old has two ways to win selection in the Aussie team if she hopes to make her second Olympic Games after competing in Tokyo in 2020 where she made the 200m semi-finals.
The first is to be ranked in the top 50 world sprinters in the 200m event on accumulated recent championship points, the second is to record a 22.57 time.
Her coach, Paul Pearce, has earmarked four meets in Europe where she can possibly win more world ranking points to lift her from her current ranking in the 80’s.
After competing in Fiji she headed off immediately to race at the selected international events with the first at Nice in France.
“Riley is a real fighter and she’ll give it her all to be named in the team when it’s announced in a few weeks time,” Coach Pearce said.
“She is still hopeful to make both the 200m sprint and the 4x100m relay side and is more than capable of getting there.”
Day first made the headlines in Australian athletics when she won the national title with a time of 22.93 breaking the time previously only bettered by Raelene Boyle and Jenny Lamy when they finished on the podium at the 1968 Olympics.
