Athletics: Expectations rise for bronze medallist Vili

Valerie Vili has enormous potential. Picture / Reuters

Valerie Vili's shot put bronze medal performance at the world championships yesterday had all the hallmarks of a future Olympic champion believes Athletics New Zealand performance director Eric Hollingsworth.

Until the championships in Helsinki, Hollingsworth had always been wary of talking up expectations for the powerful Auckland 20-year-old.

However, her massive gains in distance this year capped by a performance that was 2cm short of a silver medal yesterday meant there was no point being coy about Vili's enormous potential.

"Obviously I haven't wanted to raise expectations too high because Valerie's a young kid still, we've got to remember that," Hollingsworth told NZPA from Helsinki.

"But she's now becoming a championship performer.

"She had a silver at the Manchester Commonwealth Games and we would certainly be looking to make that gold in Melbourne.

"Then the plan is obviously Osaka (world championships) 2007 to improve on what she did here, and then the big one (Beijing Olympics).

"If she continues to rise then we might have something special to look forward to in a couple of years' time."

Vili threw 19.62m twice in the final, to win only New Zealand's second world championship medal. The first was Beatrice Faumuina's discus gold eight years ago.

"I wanted to go on and give it my best shot for the silver," Vili said.

"That didn't happen, but, you know I walked away with the bronze medal and that was fantastic.

"I am happy with the end result, and (being) able to put New Zealand on the medal count, I'm a very happy Kiwi."

She finished fractionally behind Russian silver medallist Olga Ryabinkina of Russia (19.64m) but nearly 1m behind impressive winner Nadezhda Ostapchuk of Belarus (20.51m).

When it was suggested Ostapchuk, 24, and Vili could become arch rivals at major meets, Hollingsworth gave an indication of his confidence in the New Zealander.

"Being a little bit of a gambling man myself, 2-1/2 years out from Beijing I know where my money is," he said.

"To win the world championship bronze now is exactly where she needs to be. She's still hungry, she wants to make it gold and that's what we're looking for from the high performance programme."

On Saturday morning Vili threw a New Zealand and Commonwealth record 19.87m in qualifying, adding even more to the distance she has been constantly improving this year.

Hollingsworth said he and Vili's coach Kirsten Hellier expected nothing less than giant strides.

"There is an expectation that she does keep moving forward, we don't want any glitches or holding patterns really at this stage in her life. Those things happen a little bit later when her talent matures off," he said.

"She's young and she's certainly she's hitting all her staging posts right on the money."

- NZPA