Monday, 28 January 2019:
Financial adviser Sarah Carli has become the first Australian since the great Jana Pittman in 2011 to beat evergreen Lauren Wells in the 400m hurdles.
Disregarding a race when she was stricken with food poisoning, 11-time national champ Wells has reigned supreme over domestic competition in her pet event for eight long years.
That streak came to an end on Wells' home track at the Australian Institute of Sport on Monday, with the little-known Carli stripping more than a second off her personal best to win in 55.67 seconds.
Wells, who now splits her time between athletics and primary teaching, was a close second in 55.72 - with both women bettering the qualifying mark for the world championships in Doha later this year.
"You've got to take the wins and the losses equally as gracefully," said the 30-year-old Wells.
"It's gong to be exciting to have a season where someone is pushing me.
"I can't get complacent."
Until now, Carli has held down a fulltime job in Sydney as a financial adviser and mortgage broker.
Fortuitously, her boss just happens to also be the president of Sutherland athletics club.
That should come in handy when Carli asks for more time off to train, with a spot in the Australian team for the 2019 world titles now a very real prospect.
"Lauren is an absolute legend in the 400 hurdles," she said after the boilover win at the Canberra Track Classic.
"I don't think anyone has beaten her in something like 10 years and it's an absolute honour to be the first one to do it."
Wells' previous loss to a countrywoman in the 400m hurdles was at the 2011 Perth Track Classic, in what turned out to be Pittman's last race at the elite level.
