In a thrilling discus battle, Claudio Romero of Chile took the world U18 title with 64.33m, a world U18 leading mark.

Claudio Romero starts as favourite with a best of 63.65m this year and 64.18m in 2016. The young Chilean has already won medals in the South American championships in both the U18 and U20 categories and competed in the World U20 Championships last year.

With a crouch, a spin and a truly explosive release, Werner Visser produced a huge 64.24m throw in the third round of the boys’ discus at the IAAF World Youth Championships, Cali 2015 on Saturday night (18).

With the four longest throws in the world this year, all beyond 64 metres, South Africa’s Werner Visser will go to Cali as undisputed favourite for the boys’ discus, but he will face some strong opposition from rivals around the world, not forgetting his own compatriot Patrick Duvenhage.

This has been a stellar year for Australian discus throwing with Ben Harradine and Julian Wruck both having thrown over 68 metres with the senior 2kg implement and currently lying third and fourth of the 2013 worlds lists and now they have also lifted the World youth title in Donetsk thanks to the Matthew Denny.

Young Australian thrower Matthew Denny made light of a heavy work-load in taking two gold medals as the athletics at the Australian Youth Olympic Festival finally got under way in Sydney on Saturday (19).