Athletics: Donaldson recovers to win

By Murray McKinnon

CHRISTCHURCH - Chris Donaldson overcame a bundle of nerves and an uncharacteristic bad start to capture the glamour 100m at the Marley Games in Christchurch last evening.

After two false starts, Donaldson stormed home in 10.46s to pip Australian Paul Di Bella by 0.15s.

Donaldson said the slack start was something that he would have to work on for his next two races, in Wanganui on Saturday and Papakura on Wednesday.

"It was really only over the final 40m that I started to kick the others up and I had to work pretty hard for the win tonight," he said.

"The nerves were definitely there and not knowing what the Australians were doing, and with Gus [Nketia] back in action I wasn't too sure. But I was happy with the win and a sub 10s 100m is definitely there - not in the near future, but it is there one day."

Nketia, on a comeback after injury, was quickest out of the blocks but could not sustain the effort to the end, fading to fifth in 10.67s.

Tina Paulino, of Mozambique, just missed a New Zealand allcomers 1000m record after a solo effort in 2m 32.22s. The silver medallist in the 800m at the Commonwealth Games, she missed the record by 0.22s.

Mark Keddell signalled his return to 400m racing and although being defeated by Australian Brad Jamieson, knows he is on target for the world championships in Spain in August. Jamieson recorded 46.37s with Keddell just sneaking under 47s.

In the 5000m, world mountain-running champion Jonathan Wyatt, of Wellington, was outsprinted over the final 70m by Robbie Johnston and John Henwood. Johnston was well outside the target time of 13m 20s set for a bonus of $10,000, recording 13m 45.18s.