A race meet never seems to pass without Stewart McSweyn setting some sort of new record, and the king of King Island was at it again at Penguin on Tuesday night.
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The 25-year-old not only smashed the rest of the field to take out the Tasmanian Mile Championship by over 19 seconds, but in the process set a new Australian all-comers mark of 3:50.16 for the 1609m distance, blitzing the old mark set in 1983 by New Zealand's John Walker of 3:56.7.
McSweyn also lowered his own Tasmanian record of 3:54.60 which he set in August 2018 in Birmingham.
Despite only being in the early stages of his preparation for the season, McSweyn was delighted to set the new records in front of a North-West crowd in what was his first competitive appearance at the Penguin Athletic Track.
"It's early season so you are never really sure what sort of shape you're going to be in," he said.
"There was a bit of pressure, but when I got here and saw the crowd and I thought if I'm going to run a fast time in front of any crowd, it's going to be this one.
"I'm a Tasmanian, I love running in Tasmania and I wanted to perform so I'm happy I could do that here.
"Penguin probably isn't a place you would expect a record to be run and a lot of people around the world wouldn't know where it was but hopefully it can put the town on the map a bit."
With the help of pacemaker and Victorian clubmate Adam Spencer, McSweyn set a blistering pace from the outset, sitting behind Spencer and quickly building an unassailable lead on the rest of the field.
Spencer pulled off the track at the halfway mark, leaving McSweyn by himself for the final two laps, but it seemed to make little difference to him as he continued to pour on the pace to the delight of the healthy crowd in attendance, which included his coach Nic Bideau.
Launceston duo Sam Clifford and Gus Tomlinson Smith finished in second and third place respectively, while Forth's Tom Winkel set a new Tasmanian under 16 record with his time of 4:23.70, which was good enough for seventh.
Sealed handicap honours went to Ulverstone's Aaron Harvey, with Winkel in second and Penguin's Aaron Humphrey in third.
Former Stawell and Burnie Gift winner Jacob Despard showed he will be a threat again at West Park on New Year's Eve after taking out the men's 100-yard Tasmanian Championship.
Despard clocked a new state open record of 9.66 seconds in the final, beating home in-form Queensland runner Alex Hartmann by 0.04 seconds, with Victoria's Aaron Leferink in third.
The spoils in the women's 100-yard final went to Mebourne's Hana Basic, who beat out Queensland's Hilal Durmaz and Somerset star Morgan Gaffney in a time of 10.62 seconds.
Gaffney's time of 10.83 seconds was a new Tasmanian open record.
Victorian backmarker Marcus Guglielmino (18m) took out the men's 400m handicap final, while Hobart's Amy Pedder (28m) won the women's final.
Devonport's Logan James won the men's 100m handicap final from a mark of 8.5m, with Latrobe's Tess Horton (9.75m) getting the job done in the women's final.