Krause, 14, ran a time that would've qualified her for the World Under 20 championships, if only she was old enough to go. Hers was the fastest women's time at the meet for athletes under 20.

She knocked half a second off her best time when going under 25 seconds in the heat, then took half a second more off in the final, stopping the clock at 24.22 seconds, nearly a second quicker than her fierce rival, Wollongong's Holly Rea (25.02s), who had taken honours in the pair's 100m battle.

"It was amazing to be honest," said Krause's coach Greg Wiencke, who had the highly respected Athletics Australia official David Tarbotton on the phone soon after.

"He said at the time he hadn't realised the significance of what she'd just done. Her time was obviously a world junior qualifier but to put it into perspective, she was faster than every other girl at the under 20s championships.

"And after looking at all the other states, she was faster than every other girl in the West Australian champs, Tasmanian, South Australian, ACT... and Queensland is still to come.

"He said, 'It's absolutely incredible what she's achieved... she's being compared to a Cathy Freeman at a similar age. We haven't seen something like this for a long time.'

In terms of historic perspective, Freeman ran a very similar time (24.19s) as a 17 year old at the 1990 World Junior Championships, and 23.61s when finishing fifth in that final. Four years later, Freeman was down to just over 22 seconds and winning Commonwealth Games gold, on her way to becoming an Australian track and field great (and a 400m Olympic champion).

It was a third gold medal for Krause at the Sydney meet, having claimed the women's under 16 long jump (5.59m) and triple jump double (11.62m), as well as her 100m silver.

But it was her run on the bend that has made the athletics fraternity sit up and take notice, and let the Temora teenager know she has what it takes.

"One hundred per cent. Even at our club night this week, she had a crack at the 200 and ran a low 25s on our grass in windy conditions," Wiencke said.

"Everyone else at the club night then did a PB (personal best) between 1.5 and 2 seconds after seeing what she did in her race. It's absolutely inspired everyone."

Wiencke said they came up with a strategy to try to burn her rivals coming out of the bend, and take the race away from them before hitting the straight. It worked.

"She was so determined to be ahead of her (Rea) on the bend and just ripped it... she was fired up and it was amazing to see it. I was going, 'what the hell have I just witnessed!'," Wiencke said, still stunned days later.

It was Tarbotton, a long serving athletics stats guru, media man and historian, who pointed out that Krause would begin drawing comparisons with the greats, including Freeman, after her performance.

Wiencke doesn't think it will weigh heavily on Krause.

"I think she really loves the challenge so, moving forward, I think hearing that sort of stuff is going to be a bonus, rather than a stress," Wiencke said.

Krause wasn't the only Riverina athlete to perform strongly.

The rise of Wagga jumper Daniel Okerenyang continued with a gold medal double in the under 16 boys triple jump (with a massive 13.13m effort) and long jump (6.09m).

Temora's Damian Wells won the men's under 20 hammer throw (54.02m) beating Wagga's Gerard Okerenyang by eight metres in a Riverina one-two finish.

Emily Thomas won another gold for Temora in the women's under 17 hammer throw and Lila Mccaffery seized silver in the under 16s hammer.

Kooringal-Wagga club's Nathaniel Clarke won silver in the under 15 boys 800m in an impressive 2.04.50, Kippy Langat took bronze in the under 20 boys long jump (6.43m) and Indiana Cooper bronze in the women's under 20 ambulant 100m (14.37s).

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