MANILA, Philippines, April 16 ------ Olympic aspirant Lauren Hoffman has made a habit of rearranging national records lately. In Durham, North Carolina, Hoffman, seeking a ticket to this July’s Paris Games, shattered a Philippine mark anew, this time in the women’s 100-meter hurdles where she clocked 13.41 seconds in the Duke Invitational. The reigning Asian 400m hurdles champion smashed the 17-year-old standard set by Sheena Atilano in Pune, India.
It came just a little over two weeks after she set a national record in the 400m hurdles in the Hurricane Collegiate Invitational in Coral Gables, Florida where she timed in 56.39 seconds. She destroyed the old mark of 56.44 clocked by Robyn Brown two years before in the Hanoi Southeast Asian Games. Hoffman also reset the indoor 400m mark twice, the first in Clemson, South Carolina in January when she clocked 53.91 and shattered the six-year-old record of 59.94 owned by Kayla Richardson and the other in South Carolina when she clocked 53.71 the next month in the same event.
While Hoffman is still far from the Olympic standard in 100m hurdles (12.77), 400m hurdles (54.85) and 400m (50.95), she isn’t giving up on her hope of making the quadrennial event alongside pole-vaulter EJ Obiena, gymnasts Carlos Yulo and Aleah Finnegan, boxers Eumir Marcial, Nesthy Petecio and Aira Villegas, and weightlifters Vanessa Sarno, John Febuar Ceniza and Elreen Ando.
Source: philstar.com