Standout athlete, Quamel Prince once again rewrote the record books, lowering the national 800m record on Friday at the 40th Harry Jerome Classic staged at the McLeod Athletic Park in Langley, British Colombia, Canada.
The USA-based Prince clocked 1:45.54s to triumph in the exciting two-lap race in a close finish ahead of Edose Ibadin (1:45.66) and John Rivera (1:45.93) who joined him on the podium.
En route to the victory, Prince, 29, erased his old national record (1:45.58s) which was set on May 17, 2019.
“It feels good to break the record again”, Prince told this newspaper yesterday.
He added, “I broke it back in 2019 with 1:45.58 but wasn’t really myself after that. So it feels really good to finally be back into the 1:45 club, but even better to have the record lowered by .4 seconds.”
Prince continued, “It feels really great to know that I’m the fastest man to run two laps in an entire country. It’s not something I take for granted and would hope to drop that time even lower. But overall I’m very happy and excited to be the record holder.”
Prince who is also the national 1500m record holder, will look to continue his winning ways in the latter half of the season. The victory on Friday bolstered his world ranking points ahead of the World Athletics Championships next month in Budapest, Hungary.
Said Prince, “I’m hopeful to qualify for the world championships but I’m just taking everything one day at a time. The ultimate goal is to run sub- 1:45.”
With the World Championships starting on August 19, the upcoming weeks promise a lot of excitement in track and field.
The qualifying time for the 800m event is 1:44.70s and Prince plans to earn his spot amongst the world’s best at the championships before the qualifying window shuts on July 30.
