St Joseph’s sprinter Evie Clarke blazes to national schools 200m title, puts Darwin on athletics map

Evie Clarke, a Year 11 student at St Joseph’s Catholic College in Darwin’s northern suburbs, won the national schools 200m title at the Australian All Schools Championships in Adelaide on Saturday, clocking 23.91 seconds into a slight headwind. The time ranks as the fastest by a Territorian schoolgirl since 2019 and earned her a berth in the under‑18 selection trials for next year’s Oceania Youth Championships.

Why this matters now

Darwin’s high school athletics scene has long lived in the shadow of Queensland and New South Wales powerhouses. Clarke’s victory comes at a moment when Territory school sport participation numbers are dipping, according to the latest School Sport NT annual report, secondary track-and-field registrations fell six per cent in 2025. Coaches at the Darwin Athletics Centre on Leanyer Drive say a standout performer helps reverse that trend by giving younger athletes a local role model they can see every Saturday morning.

“You can run up at the city track or out at Marrara and never see anyone crack 24 seconds in a schools final,” said one veteran club official who asked not to be named. “Now there’s a kid from the same training group every other middle schooler knows. That changes what they believe is possible.”

A school program on the rise

St Joseph’s has invested heavily in its athletics program over the past three years. The school employs a part-time sprint coach, former Northern Territory 400m record holder Ben Tapp, who works with Clarke and a squad of about 15 sprinters and jumpers three afternoons a week on the school’s all-weather track. Principal Maria Lopes told The Daily Darwin the school is now exploring a partnership with Athletics NT to host a regional schools carnival in September 2026 on the newly upgraded Marrara track, which recently received a World Athletics Class 2 certification.

Clarke also anchored St Joseph’s 4x100m relay team to a bronze medal at the same national championships. The foursome, Clarke, Year 10’s Liam Hart, Year 12’s Jade Chen and Year 9’s Sam Park, clocked 41.07 seconds, just 0.14 seconds behind the silver medallists. It is the first time a Northern Territory secondary school relay team has stood on the podium at that level since 2017.

What happens next

Clarke will rest this week before beginning a targeted six‑week block of strength and speed work under Tapp’s supervision. The under‑18 Oceania trials are scheduled for late November in Brisbane. If she finishes in the top two, she will represent Australia at the Oceania Youth Championships in Suva, Fiji, in March 2027. For now, the Darwin athletics community is watching a local teenager run faster than anyone has here in half a decade, and wondering who might follow.