SaqAustralia’s strongest team to date has assembled for the World U20 Athletics Championships which begin on Tuesday, with 67 of the country’s rising stars in Lima, Peru, to light the fuse for the Los Angeles 2028 Olympics and Brisbane 2032 Games.
Led by Paris 2024 Olympians Torrie Lewis, Peyton Craig and Claudia Hollingsworth, Australia’s Generation Next are widely tipped to improve on their most successful performance in an under-20 tournament: the 10 medals won in Sydney in 1996.
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Lewis, fresh off her 200m semi-final in Paris, is one of five athletes on the team who have also competed at the Olympics. The 19-year-old national champion wasted no time in refocusing on Lima, where she will compete in the 200m and the 4x100m relay.
“The Junior Worlds have been on my mind for the last couple of years, but this year I haven’t really had time to think about it,” Lewis said. “I’ve been to Nationals, Diamond League, relays and the Olympics… but now that I’m finally here, I’m really happy to have made it.”
Lewis isn’t content with just getting this far. After setting a new Australian national 100m record of 11.10 seconds in January 2024 – surpassing Raelene Boyle’s record set at the 1968 Olympics in Mexico – she now has bigger goals. “The only way I’m going to be happy is if I get a personal best, and if I get a personal best, I think I can win a medal.”
Alongside Parisian sprinters Sebastian Sultana and Aleksandra Stoilova, Lewis is the secret weapon in Australia’s women’s 4x100m relay. “This junior team without me has had a lot of success with two national records so they already know what they’re doing,” Lewis said. “I’m just hoping to come in with a bit of extra speed.”
Lewis’s confidence epitomises the revival of athletics led by Australia’s youth, a rise that was bolstered by performances in Paris, Australia’s best ever Games haul of 53 medals, including 18 gold, and seven won in track and field events.
Nina Kennedy won gold in the pole vault, Nicole Olyslagers and Eleanor Patterson won silver and bronze respectively in the high jump, Jemima Montag and Rhydian Cowley won bronze in the mixed marathon-walk relay, Montag also won bronze in the 20km walk, Matt Denny took bronze in the men’s discus throw and Jessica Hull won silver in the 1,500m.
A new generation is now emerging, hoping to reach the peak of its powers at the home Olympics in Brisbane in 2032.
Among them is the Australian men’s 4x100m team, who arrive in Lima as world No.1. Craig and Hollingsworth, semi-finalists in Paris and holders of the Australian under-20 800m record, also top the world rankings. There is also teenage sensation Cameron Myers, the fastest under-18 in history over 1,500m, who is set to make his debut for the Australian team at the distance as he is ranked world No.2.
Isaac Beacroft, 17, is tipped for 10,000m race walk gold. He won first place at this year’s World Race Walk Team Championships. Competing against athletes three years his senior, Isaac won his world title by just one second, becoming the youngest winner since Colombia’s Eider Arevalo in 2010.
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Raised in the Hills suburb of Sydney’s north, Beacroft is one of six Lima team leaders. “This is probably our strongest contingent ever and I think we can deliver,” Beacroft said. “I feel as confident as I can be going into a major competition and I feel like I’ve done as much preparation as I can. The main goal is to win.”
The Australian team includes 15-year-olds, such as long jumper Mason McGroder, and 19-year-old sprinter Jessica Milat, who is just hours over the age limit, having had a birthday on January 1. Marley Raikiwasa is competing in her second under-20 championship and is ranked third in the shot put and fourth in the discus, respectively.
Australia will field five relay teams in Lima, in the men’s and women’s 4x100m and 4x400m events, as well as the mixed 4x400m relay, with both teams ranked in the world’s top five. The men’s 4x100m team, ranked number one, is led by Sebastian Sultana and new sensation Gout Gout, who ran the 100m in 10.29 seconds at the Queensland Athletics Championships in March.
Gout’s South Sudanese parents moved to Australia two years before he was born and the comparisons to Usain Bolt have yet to bother him. “Usain Bolt is arguably the greatest athlete of all time and just to be compared to him is a great feeling,” the Brisbane sprinter said. “Obviously I’m Gout Gout so I’m trying to make a name for myself.”
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