Sick Briana rewrites the history books

Gisborne Intermediate runner Briana Irving on her way to the Year 8 girls' title at the NZCT AIMS Games cross country in Tauranga. Photo by Jamie Troughton/Dscribe Media Services

Gisborne Intermediate student Briana Irving (left) overcame illness to smash the Year 8 girls’ cross-country record at the NZCT AIMS Games in Tauranga yesterday.

Irving clocked 10 minutes 58 seconds for the 3km race, slashing 10secs off the record set last year and finishing 26secs clear of the field.

“She’s actually sick,” mother Belinda said after the race held at Waipuna Park. “At about 10.30am we didn’t even know if she was going to run or not.”

Briana does hills in her training but the notoriously tough hill on the Welcome Bay course and feeling sick made it an exhausting challenge.

“I was dying up that hill,” she admitted.

Training and running alongside adults at home definitely helped her, said Briana, who was second in the Y7 girls’ race last year.

Ilminster Intermediate student Le’sharn Anderson was 10th in the Y7 girls’ race yesterday and Ilminster was fourth overall in the championship school relay.

The cross-country and yachting kicked off the 2015 edition of the Games — a week-long tournament featuring 19 sports. A record 8000-plus students from 248 schools are taking part in the tournament this year.