If Melissa Breen has her way, the Australian women’s sprinting squad definitely won’t be heading back to Sri Lanka again.
The 4x100m relay team made a last-ditch bid to book a spot at the world athletics championships by entering meets in Thailand and Sri Lanka in mid-May.
The net result from the ill-fated trip was no qualifying time, a hamstring injury to Sally Pearson and severe food poisoning for just about every member of the squad, including Breen.
The Canberra runner has recovered well enough to contest the 100m and 200m at the Moscow world titles, but it has been a long haul.
“It was a doomed trip,” said Breen, whose world championships campaign in Moscow will start with the 100m heats on Sunday.
“We got severe food poisoning. I’ve had really bad gastro and was really quite sick.
“Then I developed a liver and a kidney infection which was still knocking me around in my Euro trip this year.”
The medication was affecting Breen so badly she stopped taking it altogether after an “awfully bad” run last month in Switzerland.
Since then things have got much better.
“I’m definitely not where I was but I’m still excited,” said Breen.
“I’m thinking this is what we’ve got now and there’s no point wishing it was any different because that’s just wasted energy.”
Two-time Olympic champ Shelly-Ann Fraser-Pryce from Jamaica shapes as the sprinter to beat for the women’s 100m title in Moscow in what is a much deeper field than the Usain Bolt-dominated men’s short sprint.
Nigerian Blessing Okagbare beat Fraser-Pryce in their most recent clash at the London Diamond League meet, while defending world champion Carmelita Jeter heads a typically strong US squad.
Breen is targetting a spot in the semis.
“It will depend a lot on who you draw in your heat and the standard compared to the Olympics,” said the 22-year-old, whose personal best of 11.25 seconds set in Sydney in March lifted her to seventh on the Australian alltime list.
“Even if you ran the A qualifier in London you still didn’t get out of the heats.
“It would be great to get in the semis – top 24 would be unreal.”
