Just like rampaging pole vaulter Steve Hooker, Olympic silver medallist Sally McLellan is showing no signs of a post Games hangover, producing a sizzling effort over 100m at the Queensland titles in Brisbane.

Meanwhile, Olympic pole vault silver medallist Yevgeniy Lukyanenko touched down in Sydney this morning and former world 100m record holder Asafa Powell and his posse of world class Jamaicans arrived in Melbourne ahead of the two premier events on the domestic athletics calendar - Saturday night’s Sydney Track Classic (February 28) and Melbourne’s World Athletics Tour (Thursday 5 March).

In Brisbane, McLellan clocked 11.26 seconds in the 100m heats to record the second fastest time of her career, before taking the final in 11.35 seconds ahead of rapidly improving South Australian Alicia Wrench-Doody (11.71) and Commonwealth Games representative Crystal Attenborough (11.73).

The 22-year-old recently broke the Australian record for 60m at the Boston Indoor Games and has predicted that Melinda Gainsford-Taylor’s long standing national record is in grave danger this Australian summer.

"One of us will break the Australian record come the national titles," McLellan said after her Brisbane win.

Gainsford-Taylor’s time of 11.12 was set at the Italian ski resort of Sestriere in July 1994, the same day and meeting at which Sergey Bubka set his last outdoor world record of 6.14m. Which leads to the possibility that Hooker, who is in career best form, and McLellan could break both records at the Sydney Track Classic at Homebush this Saturday night.

McLellan’s lifetime best is 11.14, set in the heats of the 2007 world championships in Osaka, and her effort in Brisbane is just outside Gainsford-Taylor’s fastest ever time by an Australian on home soil, the 11.21 set in Brisbane in March 1998.

To add spice to Saturday night’s 100m clash, McLellan will face rising Canberra teenager Melissa Breen for the first time this summer. Breen, 18, coasted to victory at the ACT championships in 11.47 seconds and boasts the fastest time by an Australian woman in 2008, with the personal best of 11.33 seconds set in Canberra in November last year.

The Australian pair will be joined by American Brianna Glenn, who has a lifetime best on 11.10 seconds, a time quicker than Gainsford-Taylor’s national record. Glenn recently won over 60m indoors in Belfast in 7.31 seconds, compared to McLellan’s 7.30 seconds in Boston, so the battle will be on in Sydney.

McLellan (PB: 12.53) will also run her pet event the 100m hurdles in Sydney, where she will face Olympic 400m hurdles champion Melaine Walker (PB: 12.75), and Commonwealth champion Brigitte Foster-Hylton (PB 12.49) of Jamaica and dual world championships finalist Jenny Adams (PB:12.63) of the USA.

Athletics Australia