I want to try and be the guy who competes for medals."
- Stewart McSweyn
Australia's premier distance runner Stewart McSweyn will wait until much closer to the Tokyo Olympic Games in July and August before deciding what event to contest.
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The former Ballarat Clarendon College student qualified for the 10,000m in Japan in taking out the national title and a third consecutive Zatopek-10 in Australian record time in Melbourne on Saturday night.
McSweyn also has Olympic qualifying times for the 1500m and 5000m - distances he ran over in this year's world championships in Doha, Qatar.
He reached the 5000m final and 1500m semi-finals.
The 24-year-old Tasmanian said his immediate objective was locking in berths in each of the three events.
He said training for all three was the same so delaying a decision had no impact on his preparation this far out.
McSweyn's plans to remain wholly focused on training and he will ultimately make his choice based on the event he is doing best in.
"I want to try and be the guy who competes for medals."
He says programming might have an influence.
The 10,000m final in scheduled for July 31, while the 5000m and 1500m heats will be run on the same day - August 4. The 5000m and 1500m finals are to be run on consecutive days - August 7 and 8.
McSweyn became the first man in more than two decades to win a hat-trick of Zatopek titles.
Ballarat's Steve Moneghetti was the last, with his sequence starting in 1989. He went onto win a fourth in a row to create a record which still stands.
McSweyn broke a national record which had stood for eight years - crossing the line in 27 minutes and 23.80 seconds.
His time was more than one second faster than Ben St Lawrence's previous mark of 27:24:95 set in 2011.
McSweyn also took more than 27 seconds off his own personal best time.
McSweyn, who grew up on King Island, was a boarder at Ballarat Clarendon College and ran with Eureka Athletic Club.
Tokyo will be his first OIympics.
He represented Australia in the 3000m steeplechase at the 2017 world championships
McSweyn stepped up in the 5000m and 10,000m in the Commonwealth Games on the Gold Coast last year, finishing fifth in the 5000m and 11th in the 10,000m.
FORMER Ballarat-based sprinter Joel Bee continued his return to athletics with second in the 100 yards at the Zatopek meet.
He chased home Jake Penny, who clocked 9.81 seconds.
Bee made a Victorian Athletic League return at Meadowglen early last month.