Diamond days for world-ranked Liam

Above: Liam Adcock collecting his bronze medal at the world indoor titles. Picture courtesy of Sona Maleterova.

Liam Adcock, the former Redcliffe Little Athlete, will jet to Japan today on the next leg of a globetrotting schedule in search of world gold.

The 28-year-old long jumper will compete at the Golden Grand Prix in Tokyo this weekend looking to maintain his stunning start to 2025.

In March, Adcock won bronze for Australia at the World Indoor Championships in Nanjing, with 8.28m – just one centimetre off silver and two off gold.

The ex-Redcliffe State High School student was back in China last month taking second in his Diamond League debut at Xiamen with 8.15m.

Now sixth in the world long jump rankings, he plans to jump at Diamond League meetings in Rome (June 6), London (July 19) and Lausanne (August 20).

With London confirmed this week, Adcock believes he will also have a “good chance” of making the sought-after Diamond League final in Zurich (August 27).

Then his attention will turn to the highlight of the athletics year - the World Championships in Tokyo from September 13-21.

“The World Championships is what I want to win,” said the former Scarborough State School student who also the current Oceania and National champion.

“If I can get to 8.40-8.50m it will all come down to what happens on the day. I’m 10cms off at the moment which is about 0.2 of a second on the runway.”

All this followed a personal best 8.33m at the Perth Track Classic on March 1, which put Adcock fifth on the Australian all-time long jump list.

He also has the top four Australian jumps this year ranging from 8.06m to 8.33m.

Now based in Brisbane, the ex-Redcliffe resident has ticked off many of his 2025 goals – world indoors, jumping 8.20m, the Diamond League … and having fun.

“All the competitions are good experience and making sure you have a good time,” Adcock said.

“I felt I was working too hard and made big changes to training, doing my own programs and fully buying into it.”

It was a bold move in a sporting career which started with Redcliffe Little As at the age of seven and has been dogged by injury.

Adcock spent five years in Little As before trying rugby, football and tennis. The latter dominated in his early teens but at 16 an elbow injury brought it to a halt.

Still harbouring an Olympic dream, Adcock and his stepbrother searched for a discipline which gave the best chance of making the Australian team.

“Triple jump seems easiest and not too many people were doing it,” Adcock recalled, “we started in the backyard and made it up as we went along!

“A coach gave some tips at a competition, including trying long jump as well. I got some ore feedback and broke my personal best by six centimetres!”

After returning to Redcliffe LA and training at Deception Bay LA, Adcock moved to Brisbane and reached his first National Championships in 2016.

He won the Queensland title and was second at Nationals in 2017, just missed the Commonwealth Games team in 2018 and was struck by injury from 2019-21.

Returning in 2022, still with an Olympic dream, Adcock impressed in Europe and in 2023 broke eight metres for the first time, earning selection for the world titles.

In a breakthrough year, Adcock won the Australian University long jump by 2cms, beating the record which had stood since 1973.

He also made the World Championships in Budapest but missed the final by one centimetre. Ironically, his 7.99m leap would have earned seventh place.

Adcock’s Olympic dream finally came true last year, but carrying an injury into the Paris Games, he finished well down the field with 7.56m jump.