Canada’s Brown breaks 20 seconds in 200 metres at Oslo Diamond League

It was a goal Aaron Brown had been doggedly chasing for the past two years.

The Canadian sprinter raced to a time of 19.98 seconds to finish second in the Bislett Games Diamond League meet in Oslo on Thursday night, finally breaking the 20-second barrier for the first time in his career.

First thoughts after crossing the finish line?

“It’s about damn time,” Brown laughed.

The Toronto native became just the third Canadian to break the 20-second mark. He also joined Andre De Grasse as the only other Canadian to break both the 10-second barrier in the 100 metres, and the 20-second mark in the 200.

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Turkey’s Ramil Guliyev, the reigning world champion, ran 19.90 to win.

Later, Sage Watson of Medicine Hat, Alta., finished third in the women’s 400-metre hurdles in 54.55 seconds.

Brown’s previous best 200 was 20 seconds flat in Baton Rouge, La., in April of 2016.

“It doesn’t get any closer than that,” Brown said. “I did that two years ago and I felt like I was ready to do it that season and it didn’t happen, and I’ve been chasing it ever since, and to finally get it is a weight off my shoulders.”

Brown had to wait what “seemed like an eternity” until his time finally flashed up on the scoreboard at Bislett Stadium.

“They only showed the winner’s time at first, and all of us were sitting there waiting, trying to figure out what we ran,” he said in a phone interview from Norway. “They finally put it up on the board, and I saw what I ran, and I jumped up and down and was like ‘Yes!’ and I was fist-pumping. Then I thought, ‘Hold on, let me look at the wind.’ I looked back (at the wind gauge reading) and saw 1.0, and thought ‘Yes, it counts.’”

A legal wind is anything under 2.0 metres per second.

Brown has had an excellent season so far, racing to silver at the Commonwealth Games in April. That podium finish was redemption for his disappointment at last year’s world championships, where he was a favourite to win a medal, but was disqualified for stepping on the line.

“When things like that happen, you can either let it break you or use it as motivation, and I try to do the latter, and not give up and get down on myself,” he said.

The 26-year-old said he felt like he was ready for a breakthrough. He’s been working hard on race strategy with his American coach Dennis Mitchell, the bronze medallist in the 100 at the 1992 Barcelona Olympics.

“I feel like I’ve been figuring out the race piece by piece, breaking it down at practice and then starting out with the Commonwealth Games so early in the season, it gave me a chance to get my rhythm pretty early, having three runs pretty early. and I’ve just carried that momentum forward,” Brown said.

Brown will fly Friday to Stockholm for the next stop on the Diamond League circuit on Sunday, where he’ll run against Guliyev once again.

“A goal (this season) was to definitely run sub-20, so now that I’ve done it I just want to keep continuing to improve and continuing to hone my race strategy, and fix my flaws and see how fast I can go by the end of the year,” Brown said. “The main goal is to get enough points to get to the Diamond Final and once I get in there, try to battle for the win.”

The Diamond League Final is Aug. 30 in Zurich.

Lori Ewing, The Canadian Press