THAT’S GOLD … FEAR OF NAN SPURS RILEY

TRACK flash Riley Day runs without fear except when it involves her 69-year-old nan threatening her with a breathless 400m with the most wacky of challenges.

The Gold Coast Victory Athletics Club sprinter produced the perfect double gold climax to the Commonwealth Youth Games in the Bahamas yesterday with a strong 200m triumph and the anchor leg to a mixed relay success.

The value of the past week for Day, 17, was always going to be backing up races day after day, handling curveballs like her narrow 100m defeat with maturity and getting her first taste of a multi-sport event.

Yesterday’s sapping 33C heat in Nassau was another variable for her seven-race program but it was all valuable preparation for a full-on tilt at qualifying for the Commonwealth Games on the Gold Coast in April.

“Seven races is definitely very tiring but when you get the results it’s 110 per cent worth it,” the Beaudesert High student said after a sharp 23.42 sec run for the 200m into a headwind.

Being able to perform with her 69year-old grandmother Deanne in the grandstand was a more private high because so often has she been encouraging and the driver for training in the Beaudesert Little Athletics Club days.

“Nan has always been one of my biggest supporters and she even bet me if she could run under two minutes for 400m I had to race 400m,” Day said with a laugh.

“I wasn’t willing to risk it. She even trained for it and I had to say, ‘Nan, stop ... no way am I doing a 400m.”

Having such fun is an upbeat part of the make-up for the teenager who raced track king Usain Bolt in last summer’s hit Nitro Athletics series in Melbourne and it was overflowing for all four teens in the mixed 4 x 100m relay yesterday.

It was an all-Queensland crew with Townsville‘s Jake Doran joining Day and Caboolture duo Ella Connolly and Ben Schmidtchen.