Ella Connolly

At just 24, Ella Connolly is the best all-round sprinter Australia has had in two decades. Fourth in the 400m at the World U20 Championships in 2018, in recent years she has been concentrating on the short sprints and been a key member of the National 4x100m relay team that has broken the long-standing national record and booked a place at the Paris Olympics.

Growing up in Burpengary, located mid-way between Brisbane and the Sunshine Coast, Ella started competing in athletics aged 10 and enjoyed instant success, winning the 100m at the 2010 National Primary School competition. She would later join Deception Bay Little Athletics, where she would commit to serious training and fall in love with the sport.

From her mid-teenage years, Ella had drawn attention for her incredible speed, winning numerous national junior/age sprint trebles. Selected for the 2017 Youth Commonwealth Games in the Bahamas, she won medals in the 200m and 400m - just days after her seventeenth birthday.

In the 400m she clocked the extraordinary time of 52.72 – faster than Cathy Freeman at that age, these results earning her selection in the Australian senior team for the 2017 World Championships (4x400m relay). Unfortunately, she missed selection for the 2018 Commonwealth Games in her home state of Queensland due to hamstring injury, only to return later that year to achieve fourth in the 400m at the 2018 World U20 Championships.

Over the following years Ella concentrated on the 100m/200m clocking brilliant times. In January 2021 she ran brilliant times of 11.21 (windy) and 22.96. On one day in December 2021, she recorded two PBs 11.25 in the 100m and 52.28 for 400m. Over the 2021-22 summer she consistently ran quick in the short sprints and in her second 400m outing in March, again lowered her PB to 52.21. She ran four sub-11.30 100s and five sub-23.20 times, winning both national titles in April. In her occasional 400m races, Ella had clocked 52-second times in 2020, 2021 and 2022.

For the 2022 World Championships Ella competed in the 200m heats then two weeks later at the Commonwealth Games she progressed her way through the 200m rounds to placed sixth in the final.

It was the highest place by an Aussie in this event for 20 years. She then joined the 4x100m relay team running just the final and helped the team to fourth place. Eleven months later, in July 2023, the Australian team was elevated to the bronze medal following the disqualification of the winners Nigeria for a doping violation.

In 2023 she was second in the national 200m championship and at the end of summer moved to Sydney coach Andrew Murphy. In August she was selected in the 200m and 4x100m relay for the Budapest World Championships, but unfortunately a hamstring injury in the leadup prevented her from taking her position in the team.

Her 2024 campaign was off to a great start breaking the national 60m record before closing the season winning silver in the national 100m. Throughout the summer she held down the third leg on the Australian 4x100m relay and in March helped them to break the 24-year-old National record. In May at the World Relays, the team again lowered the record and secured a berth at the Paris Olympics for Australia. In June she claimed the Oceania 100m title in Suva Fiji.