W80 Christa Bortignon closing in on Irene Obera WRs in 100, 200

Christa has been setting sprint records for years.

Christa Bortignon of Vancouver, British Columbia, continued her world record tear a couple weekends ago, claiming a W80 triple jump WR at the Dylan Armstrong meet in Kamloops. (See results here.) She spanned a legal 7.16 (23-6), destroying the listed WR of 6.55 (21-6) by Sweden’s Elsa Enarsson in 2010. But she’s still short of her recent indoor TJ of 7.42 (24-4 1/4). So what excited me in the results? Christa is breathing down Irene Obera’s neck in the 1 and 2. At the same meet, Christa ran Canadian records 17.14 for 100 and 37.00 for 200 — just off Irene’s listed WRs of 16.81 and 36.80 at 2014 Winston-Salem nationals. She tells me she’s taking a break until BC Masters Championships next month. Should be a doozy.

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May 16, 2017

8 Responses

  1. Mary Harada - May 17, 2017

    I wish Christa good health and good luck as she challenges Irene’s WRs. Records are made to be broken – they are what inspires hard training and sacrifice. Push the goal posts out even further Christa.

  2. Matt B. - May 17, 2017

    Irene’s 35.69 didn’t count?
    I wonder if in a couple years the Women’s 80 and Men’s 90 WR’s will be just about on par. In a few years I can see the 100-200-400-800 for M90 –
    16.9 35.6 1:31.1 3:36

  3. Peter L. Taylor - May 18, 2017

    Matt B. (no. 2): For Irene’s 35.69 I think they were missing the wind reading (can’t say for sure). I’m here this time, however, to give a shout out to Allen Woodard, a superstar you and I really respect (as we respect Irene).

    I just hand-timed the 49.09 in the 400 that Allen ran a couple of months ago; I got 48.9. Not particularly important, but it shows that Allen was in the ballpark.

    I’m giving Allen his due because he is moving up through the ranks among masters tracksters who have apparently set records on multiple occasions but fell short when it came to ratification.

    As you know, Matt, Allen has the world M45 mark in the 400 at 49.69, and he also has the American M45 mark at 49.32 (set at 2016 nationals). Yes, the 49.32 did not get accepted as the world record. Of course, Allen has numerous times faster than 49.69, albeit it’s the official world mark.

    I was hoping that Allen’s 49.09 would get accepted, but I found out today that the zero control test was incomplete. Thus, I am not optimistic. Too bad, as Allen is a great runner.

  4. Alan Kolling - May 18, 2017

    Kudos to Christa’s extraordinary performances to date in the jumps and, yes, Irene fully expects Christa to better her sprint marks easily in the coming months as well, especially if she can stay healthy. We both wish her well and follow her exploits with admiration and awe.

    BTW Irene’s 35.69 was one of nine world records she set that failed to gain formal recognition in 2014 for any of a number of reasons, e.g. failure to do a ZCT, lack of proper tape measurement, lack of wind reading, ad nauseam.

  5. Matt B. - May 18, 2017

    Peter. Rooting for Allen to dip into the 48’s this summer!
    By the way, wish I could defend 800 at Sierra Gold. Unfortunately, just coming off achilles inflammation. How fortunate indeed they are to have you as the announcer.
    What a track meet! Only one thing missing to polish this off as a world class meet is to add a live stream.
    Hope to be there next year. Do you know where to find current status of entries?

  6. Peter L. Taylor - May 18, 2017

    Thank you for your kind words, Matt. It’s 2:26 AM in Virginia, and I have to leave for the airport at 5:15. I Googled “Sierra Gold Masters,” and it came right up, with the list of registrants at the bottom.

    I was going to do a count, but I did one late yesterday. Actually, I just counted the number of event entries and divided that number by 2.3. I came up with an estimated 203 actual entrants, although I do think they allow post entry.

  7. t-bird - May 19, 2017

    159 entrants at this point.

  8. Matt B. - May 21, 2017

    http://m7.timerhub.com/search.php?find=redcaptiming.com/2017/sgtff/#_event_index

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