PERTH, March 16: Australia’s Olympic 400 metres champion Cathy Freeman returned to the event Saturday for the first time since the Sydney 2000 Games, winning comfortably at a national series meeting.

Freeman crossed the line in a comparatively slow 52.59 seconds, 10 metres ahead of second-placed Australian Katerina Dressler (54.02), her training partner, while another Australian Kylie Wheeler (54.84) was third.

“If anything I was careful not to go out too hard. The first 100 metres was conservative but I had heaps of strength coming home,” Freeman told reporters after battling a head wind in the final 100 metres.

Freeman said she was confident of running faster times in the 400 metres before heading to the United States in May for a training camp.

She will run at the Australia national championships in Brisbane next month to qualify for this year’s Manchester Commonwealth Games.

Freeman, 29, a world champion in 1997 over 200 metres and in 1999 over 400 metres, said recently she wanted to win the double at Manchester.

Australia’s most prominent Aboriginal athlete, Freeman lit the cauldron to open the Sydney Olympics and won the 400 metres before taking a year off.

She returned to training in November last year weighing 65 kilos, but has shed 11 |kilos and is now only two above her racing weight of 52.—Reuters