New sprint sensation, 14, turns heads with sizzling 200m age group world record
A 14-year-old American sprint sensation taking the athletics world by storm broke the 200-metre girls world record for her age in a scintillating run on Thursday (AEST).
Melanie Doggett, a sprint prodigy from Georgia, claimed her age group's state championship 200m title in 22.71 seconds.
Doggett pinched the world record off another American teen phenom, Camryn Dailey, who last month clocked 22.73.
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Doggett demolished the field in her record-breaking run at the University of Georgia, finishing 1.17 seconds ahead of second place.
She made the most of a tailwind measuring +2.00 metres per second. Any stronger and the conditions would have been considered illegal.
Doggett's 22.71 makes her the equal-ninth-fastest under-18 athlete in global history.
World Athletics lists her 100m personal best as 11.39, although she ripped an 11.01 last month in a race that had no wind information.
Dailey's personal bests are 11.39 (100m) and 22.73 (200m).
American track icon Florence Griffith-Joyner is the women's world record holder in both the 100m (10.49) and 200m (21.34). She set both records way back in 1988.
Doggett and Dailey have both been signed by Nike.
They are prodigiously talented sprinters shaping as stars of the Brisbane 2032 Olympics.
Doggett and Dailey could well be up against precocious Australian sprinter Charlotte Ehioghae at Brisbane 2032 – a Perth schoolgirl with personal bests of 11.47 (100m) and 23.07 (200m).
Ehioghae dazzled at the national junior athletics championships in Brisbane last month, claiming the under-16 200m title in 23.07 to become the second-fastest under-18 athlete in Australian history behind Raelene Boyle, not including hand-timed results.
