NORTH-West athlete Deon Kenzie has run faster than any para-athlete before him, clocking a 1500m world record in the T38 classification of 4.08.51 in Hobart yesterday afternoon.
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The Forth 18-year-old had previously won a bronze medal in his classification for the 1500m at the IPC World Championships in Lyon, France last year with a time of 4:14.21.
Kenzie, who has cerebral palsy, is the reigning Tasmanian under-18 athlete of the year and in October at the Tasmanian all-schools track and field championship at Penguin, registered a new personal best time of 4:09.58.
That run signalled his intention of breaking the existing T38 1500m world record of 4:09.50, which has been held by Abbes Saidi, of Tunisia, since July 2005.
Kenzie’s coach Mike Gunson said the conditions were excellent for his charge’s record run at The Domain track in Hobart and he followed the pre-race plan perfectly.
Kenzie competed against a field of 15 able-bodied athletes, finishing second overall.
‘‘Deon and I both live in Devonport, so we made the journey down to The Domain, because we knew there would be a good field of athletes,’’ Gunson said.
‘‘As it turned out the conditions were, not perfect but pretty good.
‘‘We set ourselves up to do it, we made it public, and from an IPC point of view we had three television cameras here filming the event so it’s good for athletics in Tasmania. It’s just good for para-athletics.’’
Gunson said Kenzie’s next major race would hopefully be at the 2015 IPC World Championships in Doha, Qatar.
Kenzie’s new world record will need to be ratified as official by the IPC.