Shaquille Dill, the Bermuda middle-distance runner, was back to his very best at the Shamrock Invitational outdoor track and field meet in Myrtle Beach, South Carolina, at the weekend.

The Saint Augustine’s University student won the 800 metres seeded race at Myrtle Beach High School’s Doug Shaw Stadium in a time of 1min 48.87sec, slashing more than two seconds off of his school’s record which previously stood at 1:51.14

Dill is ranked tenth in the nation in the 800 and seventh in the 400 and also holds the Bermuda national junior 800 record.

His victory in a field of 29 runners went some way towards compensating for a disappointing showing at this month’s NCAA Division II Indoor Championships in Pittsburg, Kansas, where he finished eighth in the 800 final.

He reached the final after pipping compatriot Dage Minors, who attends Franklin Pierce University, for the eighth and final spot by three-tenths of a second in the preliminaries.

Dill was also eighth in the 400 final in 49.59 while his school’s 4x400 relay team, which he was a member of, did not reach the final.

Meanwhile, among those who competed at last weekend’s Shamrock Invitational track and field meet were runners Zola Budd-Pieterse, the two-times cross-country World Champion and three-times Olympian, American Bershawn Jackson, the bronze medal winner in the 400 metres hurdles at the 2008 Olympic Games in Beijing.

Budd-Pieterse, the Coastal Carolina volunteer assistant coach, ran the 5,000 and Jackson in the 800, 4x200m and 4x400.