Source :- THE AGE NEWS
No one knew Gout was even going to be there. It was a secret race at a nondescript Brisbane meet in front of a scattering of people, with no expectations he would do anything special. Then Gout did something remarkable.
On Saturday afternoon in his first race of the year, Gout ran 10 seconds flat for the 100 metres – the fastest time ever by an Australian aged under 20 and the third-fastest time by an Australian man over 100m on home soil.
The decision for him to race at the meet was made late, and was deliberately kept quiet by his team. No one knew Gout was coming.
Now the world is reminded that the Australian sprinter is indeed coming.
“He was feeling pretty confident he would run quick because of his training,” Gout’s manager James Templeton said.
“It wasn’t a ‘rust buster’, he didn’t really have any rust, but you also don’t (typically) run PB’s in your first race of the year (as Gout did).
“I hoped he would run 10.10s or 10.15s, and if he did we would have been happy with that. We just wanted him to have a race, we didn’t put any expectations or demands on him.
“It was a season opener, a small little meet just to have a test over 100m. No one knew we were coming. It was perfect. It hadn’t been in the schedule but Di (his coach Di Sheppard) said ‘he is running well, I might give him a gallop’.”
The run was all about building into the season, with Sheppard and Gout targeting the Queensland Athletics Championships from March 12-15 to kick up a gear; a move that will threaten more records in the 100m and 200m.
Gout already holds the Australian men’s 200m record, but at that Brisbane meet it’s possible he will become the first Australian male to break 10 seconds for the 100m on home soil.
While Gout will also run at the Maurie Plant Meet in Melbourne on March 28 and the National Titles in Sydney on April 10-12, neither of those races is reliably favourable to speed the way the Brisbane heat is.
A big crowd is now expected at the Queensland Championships, where entry costs just $6 a day – or $13 for the weekend.
“He has a couple of good runs in him for there (Queensland),” Templeton said.
The Queensland track was also the site of the performances that catapulted Gout into public recognition. As a 16-year-old at the All Schools Championships, he broke Peter Norman’s 200m record in times that were better than Usain Bolt ran at the same age.
Gout Gout’s remarkable feats just keep coming.Credit: Getty Images
Saturday’s secret race now has the world talking Gout again.
One of the first messages Templeton received after the run was from Lance Baumann, coach of the reigning Olympics 100m champion Noah Lyles, with whom Gout has trained.
“Lance messaged me to say ‘the boy is coming, but no surprises there’,” Templeton said.
“I’ve been on the phone constantly since he ran. Guys from the US, all around the world, have been ringing and messaging. It’s people in the sprint community and the media.”
Gout’s 10-second run was the same time Lachlan Kennedy clocked in Perth in April 2025. Kennedy then ran a 9.98s 100m in Nairobi later last year. Australia’s fastest ever man over 100m was Patrick Johnson, who ran a legal 9.93s in Japan in 2003.
Gout’s run set a new Australian under-20 record, bettering the 10.15s set by Jake Doran in 2018. Doran, was quick to congratulate Gout on social media.
“It was only a matter of time! Proud it took someone of Gout’s calibre to eclipse my mark,” Doran wrote.
Gout’s latest time affirmed his qualification for this year’s world under-20 championships, which was something of a formality.
The now 18-year-old had already declared his plan not to compete at the Commonwealth Games in Glasgow, so he could instead focus on the 200m at the world under-20 championships in Eugene Oregon, which commence three days after the Glasgow event.
Gout wants to claim the world junior title in what will be his last opportunity, and in so doing emulate Bolt, who won 200m gold at the 2002 world juniors before going on to become the best sprinter of all time.
