Cameron Myers is in Year 12 and already making his mark in middle-distance running. Photo: Cameron Myers Facebook.
There aren’t too many Canberra Year 12 students with a Wikipedia page. Cameron Myers has one and it’s already starting to fill with his remarkable achievements.
The running world has been talking about 17-year-old Cameron for a couple of years, especially after he broke the world record last year for the fastest mile by a 16-year-old. He became the second youngest in the world to break the four-minute barrier for the mile.
Since then, there has been an avalanche of success.
He had a victory over the 2022 World Champion Jake Wightman over 1500 metres, and he finished third to Stewart McSweyn and Wightman at the Maurie Plant meet in Melbourne.
At the Sydney Track Classic on the weekend, Cameron won the 3000 metres, shaving almost six seconds off his personal best.
His running style is best described as fearless.
Veteran coach Dick Telford has trained plenty of champions over the years and he has done well to keep Cameron grounded amidst the hype, which has extended well beyond the bubble-like running community.
Not that Cameron has a personality that lends itself to getting carried away.
After he broke the record for the fastest mile by a 16-year-old, I asked him about his ambitions. He responded that his focus was on progressing through the senior ranks and eventually winning a global medal.
He also listed his older training partners as role models.
It’s obvious he is well-grounded. This is just as well as comparisons are being made with Norwegian 2020 Olympic 1500 metres champion Jacobs Ingebrigtsen.
They have vastly different styles, but there are similarities. Ingebrigtsen was the youngest to run a sub-four-minute mile in 2017. Six years later, Cameron was nine days older when he bettered the four-minute mark, but his time was close to two seconds faster.
Ingebrigtsen, now 23 years of age, has gone on to become one of the greats in middle distance running with two world championship titles to go with his best, Olympic gold.
For now, Cameron’s focus is on next month’s national titles in Adelaide where he will be vying for a berth on the team for the Paris Olympics.
The hurdles he will face in Adelaide will be formidable in the form of Olympic finalist McSweyn and the Commonwealth Games gold medallist Ollie Hoare.
He won’t be daunted. In fact, the Lake Ginninderra College student appears to thrive in this environment.
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