“I mean, honestly, we just take little steps … chasing that big sub (20 and 10 seconds),” he said.
“I came off the bend after that rocky start, after a false start, and as soon as the gun went, I was flying, and just came home.
“It’s pretty crazy. Right now I can’t process it, but I guess tonight when I go to bed, I’ll think about it.
“These are adults. And me, I’m just a kid, and I’m running them [down].”
Naturally, there is a danger of over-hyping a teenager and loading unfair pressure on him. But these are performances that cannot be ignored. A time of 20.04s would have placed sixth in the final at the Paris Olympics for the 200m.
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Bolt’s world record for the 200m is 19.19 seconds, set back in 2009.
Gout embraces the pressure. He is not concerned by making predictions about breaking times and winning medals and thus far has responded each time. Earlier this year he was second at the world juniors in the 200m he ran quicker than Bolt’s championship record for a 16-year-old, and was only beaten by an athlete nearly two years older than him.
“I’ve been getting pressure. My video went viral right before world juniors and that already gave a lot of pressure for me. But for me, you know they say pressure makes diamonds. I guess I’m better than a diamond right now,” he said.
Gout Gout (centre) celebrates his new Australian benchmark with manager James Templeton and coach Di Sheppard.Credit: Getty Images
“I’ve always done what I said I would. So if I said something, it’s on my mind, and I’m pursuing it until I get it. ”
There was something almost unkind about watching Gout run against schoolboys. Yes, they are his contemporaries, but they are peers in age only. This was a peerless performance.
‘You know, they say pressure makes diamonds. I guess I’m better than a diamond right now.’
Australian sprint sensation Gout Gout
While Gout was the dominant figure of the schools championships, another national record was broken when 15-year-old South Australian Ken Ferrante Tanikawa ran 12.59s for the boys’ under-16 110m hurdles to break Sasha Zhoya’s record.
For context, Zhoya was a dual Australian-French citizen who moved back to live in France in 2020 and won gold the next year at world juniors. In 2023, he made the semi-final at the world championships in Oregon.
