Many-time National champion Natoya Goule-Toppin is fed up with running just one round at the National Trials each year in the women’s 800m in order to qualify for international track and field championships.

Over the years, the number of competitors in the middle-distance events, and especially the 800m, have been very limited, forcing the organisers to have a straight final for almost all events longer than 400m.

Goule-Toppin has been very dominant at the National Championships and has won eight national titles.

A few years ago, she was pushed by Samoya Campbell and this year the major competition is set to come from Chris-Ann Gordon who stepped up from the 400m to the 800m this season as the only female other than Goule-Toppin to dip below the two-minute barrier so far in 2022.

For Goule-Toppin, competing at the National Championships, and being almost unchallenged each year, is not very difficult mentally as her focus is usually on her own performance and not of that of her local competitors.

“For a few years I did have Samoya Campbell pushing me and I think this year I will have another person in Chris-Ann Gordon, but it’s not as difficult as it seems because when I train, I basically run by myself because I train with boys.

“So, I just go out there and try to focus on the clock and ensure that I am running a good time according to what my coach wants me to do, I would do it, so I wouldn’t say that it’s difficult,” she explained.

For Goule-Toppin, the challenge is not being able to properly prepare her body for competitive action.

“The difficult part of it is to not able to do rounds, just doing one run and then have to go to a championship and then have to do three rounds of running. That’s the most challenging part of running at Trials each year, not being able to run more than one round.

“I will not let that affect what I am supposed to do, but I just wanted to be able to do more than one round so that it can help me to prepare for Oregon, because when you go and compete with your competitors they have that experience of running more than one round, so it’s easier on their body.

“So, for me I do one round, then I am just used to doing one round (and no more).”

She is hoping that in the near future the number of participants at the Trials will increase enough to give her more pre-championship competitive action.

“I hope and pray that in the future we will have more persons so that we can at least run two rounds at the championships.”

The women’s 800m has been switched from Saturday to Sunday to fit the schedule that the athletes will have at the World Championships in Oregon, USA, next month.