We’re in the midst of the World Championships- not the Ultra MultiEvents World Championships, but the geniune one; where athletes pick one or at a push, two events in which to compete with some level of competence.
Needless to say, I am binge-watching; both on TV and IRL. There has been a disappointing lack of new World Records so far; so instead, I’ve been looking at age-category records, particularly as a way to guage my own progress.
In my best event, 100m, I could have been beaten by both 8 year old Lauren Williams and 61 year old Karle Del Grande, who would both cross the line in 13.63. According to Power Of Ten rankings, this year, 149 British girls under-13 could have beaten me. Take that, child #150.
However, if we were to look at one of my weaker events, things look more miserable still. Let’s take 1500m. 5 year old Yasmin Lopez would have finished over 40 seconds ahead of me. I can take consolation in having a far better race with 75 year old, Elfriede Hodapp- who would still have won by 5 seconds.
Perhaps my best shot at a World Record would be to hang for another couple of decades, to claim the mysteriously missing (at least from Wikipedia) V50 record for 400m hurdles.
Tetradecathlon 