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Savannah Sutherland OLY (born August 7, 2003) is a Canadian track and field athlete. She is the 2021 World U20 Championships bronze medalist and 2023 NCAA Outdoor champion in the 400 metres hurdles, and holds the Canadian national record in that distance, as well as the national indoor 400 metres record. Sutherland represented Canada at the 2024 Summer Olympics.[1]
| Personal information | |
|---|---|
| National team | Canada |
| Born | August 7, 2003 Saskatoon, Saskatchewan, Canada |
| Height | 175 cm (5 ft 9 in) |
| Sport | |
| Country | Canada |
| Sport | Athletics |
| Event | 400 m hurdles |
| College team | Michigan Wolverines |
| Achievements and titles | |
| Personal bests | 400 m: 51.41 (Geneva 2023) 400 m hurdles: 53.26 NR (Eugene 2024) |
Medal record | |
Sutherland was born in Saskatoon[2] and grew up in Borden, Saskatchewan, where she was educated at Borden School. After being identified as a potential competitive sprinter, she attended her first official track meet the week before the 2016 Summer Olympics, which she subsequently identified as a spur to pursue athletics seriously.[3][4] She finished her schooling at Bishop James Mahoney High School in Saskatoon, in order to have greater access to training facilities and coaches. Her time at Mahoney coincided with the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, and as a result participation in provincial track and field competitions was at the time severely curtailed.[4] In 2021, Sutherland committed to attend the University of Michigan.[5][6]
Sutherland competed as a fifteen-year-old at the Canadian under-20 national championships in Montreal in 2019, and won silver in the 100 metres hurdles and bronze in the 200 metres sprint.[7] By 2021, Sutherland reportedly held the most provincial records in Saskatchewan track and field athletics history.[8] Sutherland won titles at the national under-20 level in the 400 metres hurdles, and also won gold in the same event representing Saskatchewan at the 2022 Canada Summer Games.[9][10]
In her international debut competing for Canada, Sutherland was assigned to the 2021 World Athletics U20 Championships in Nairobi. She set a new personal best time of 57.27 to finish third in the women's 400 metres hurdles. She described the experience as "a little overwhelming" but "very positive overall."[11]
At the collegiate level with the University of Michigan, Sutherland helped the Michigan Wolverines to the Big Ten championship in February of 2023.[12] Competing at the 2023 NCAA Indoor Championships later in March, she set a new Canadian national record of 51.60s in the indoor 400 metres.[13] In June, she won the 400 metres hurdles at the NCAA Outdoors Championships in Austin, Texas, running 54.45 to upset favourite Britton Wilson.[14] Following her successful NCAA season, Sutherland was selected for the Canadian delegation for the 2023 World Athletics Championships in Budapest, her debut at the international senior level. She reached the semi-finals of the women's 400 metres hurdles, ultimately finishing sixteenth.[15]
At the start of the 2024 global outdoor athletics calendar, Sutherland ran what was briefly a world-leading time of 54.86 seconds in the women’s 400 metres hurdles at a meet in Gainesville, Florida in early April. She followed that up by running a personal best time of 23.32 seconds in the women’s 200 metres the following week at a meet in Lexington, Kentucky.[16] At the end of the month, she set a new meet record of 55.36 seconds at the Penn Relays.[17] In May, Sutherland won her second Big Ten championship in the 400 metres hurdles in a time of 55.01 seconds.[18] In the preliminaries of the NCAA Outdoor Championships, Sutherland won her qualifying heat in a time of 54.04, breaking Sage Watson's Canadian 400 m hurdles record of 54.32 from 2019. Competing in the final on June 8, she ran another personal best and Canadian record to finish second in 53.26.[19]
Sutherland was named to the Canadian Olympic team for the 2024 Summer Olympics in Paris, which she likened to a "fever dream."[4][3] Competing in the 400 metres hurdles, she first reached the semi-finals. She finished with the sixth-fastest qualifying time, despite finishing fourth in her semi-final heat, and reached the final in her first appearance at the Olympics.[20] This was the first time a Canadian woman had reached the event final since Rosey Edeh in 1996. Sutherland finished seventh with a time of 53.88. She described the crowds at the Stade de France as "unlike anything I’ve ever experienced."[21] She was then invited to join the Canadian team for the women's 4 × 400 metres relay for the first time, helping them place sixth in the event final. Sutherland said afterward that "this was my first time running on the 4x400 but I’m looking forward to seeing when we work together a couple more times."[22]
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