KEY POINTS:
The Tokoroa Flyer? The Toke Express?
It's been a struggle trying to find a nickname for Monique Williams, the 21-year-old from Waikato who tore through the national athletic championships in Taranaki last weekend, winning five gold medals.
Williams is in Brisbane this weekend taking on Australia's best in
the 200 and 400 metres. She will do so with plenty of confidence and a pocket full of gold, having cleaned up in the 100m, 200m, 400m and relays events in Inglewood.
After injury knocked her hopes of qualifying for last year's Commonwealth Games in Melbourne, she has bounced back, running a personal best to beat the evergreen Chantal Brunner in the national 100m.
And in Sydney last month, she went within 0.2s of a B qualifying 200m time for this year's athletic world championships in Osaka.
Williams deserves a decent nickname, but they've not rolled off the tongue with the speed she displays around the track. One thing is for sure. Tokoroa would have to be in there somewhere.
Williams may live in Hamilton - where she is studying for a sport and leisure degree - and race out of Auckland with the rest of her New Zealand relay teammates. But she is Tokoroa through and through.
Her parents and a brother, Gareth, still live there and the town has played a big part in supporting her athletics career, which began when she was a preschooler filling in for her brothers' relay teams.
The town does its best to help to finance Williams' career - her father and coach Chris even talks of old-age pensioners who approach, insisting that he take $5 to help Monique.
Which brings us to the biggest factor in the Monique Williams story. Family.
Mum Caron is in charge of raising the finance, which has involved re-mortgaging their house a few times, although the task she cringes at is knocking on doors around Christmas.
Chris Williams, of Liverpool origins, is a boilermaker-turned-athletics coach who followed his three kids into the sport.
As Chris acknowledges, he's easy to spot in a crowd - a big lad with a ponytail sprouting out of a brown hat.
The eldest of six children, he hardly had time for a sports career of his own. He was 29 when he took up rugby, and soon afterwards, he took the first steps towards becoming an athletics coach.
He was inspired along the way by a meeting with the legendary Arthur Lydiard but is mainly self-taught.
Today, Williams looks after 25 athletes - from the recreational to the serious.
No sooner had I rung Chris this week to arrange a meeting than he announced: "I'll start emailing you Monique's history."
This tallied with an enthusiasm athletics officials had already told me about. Sure enough, five hefty emails arrived.
We arrange to meet at Auckland Airport where I find Monique, Chris, Caron and Monique's boyfriend Caleb Taylor - a commercial diver - killing time three hours before boarding.
"We don't like to leave anything to chance," says Chris Williams of their early arrival.
Which leaves plenty of time for Monique to answer a few questions.
Congratulations on your medals in Taranaki. What is your main aim at the Australian championships?
I could go for a win in the 200m - although the timetable for it isn't quite the best because the heat and final are on Sunday and I'll have already done two 400m races. But the 200 is my best event right now.
There is talk of you moving up to the 800m.
I started off running 800m and moved down to the sprints in about the sixth form. But I'm really going well in the sprints and I want to hold on to that. I want to make the next Commonwealth Games and everybody dreams of making the Olympics.
Is speed a family trait?
My brother Kurt won silver medals in the 800m and 1500m at the national secondary champs. Mum did the hurdles and high jump at school, and dad did a bit of long distance. Maybe it is in the genes, but I'm the one who has developed it.
The word is, this all started with pies and iceblocks.
I was a tiny tot, about 4 years old, and people would bribe me with a pie or an iceblock to fill in for my brothers' relay teams.
From there it went on to winning red ribbons when I was about 6 or 7 years old and I loved that. That's what got me interested, and I haven't stopped since.
Right. The big question. How's the father-daughter relationship. How do you cope with your coach?
We work pretty well together. We just accept each other's ways. There's not much conflict, quite surprisingly. I know it's not normal - you hear about those tennis players and it's always the father who is the controversial one. Dad has trained me since I was 12. I've never even thought of getting another coach. He saw his children had a talent and he picked it up from there. Mum and dad are calm. He never embarrasses me. I'm a quiet person and I wouldn't like someone yelling at me from the sideline.
Your parents have put the house on your career, literally.
I know. They've kept re-mortgaging the house over the years to get me places - each time I think, "Oh God"; it makes me feel bad. No, not really, it just makes me appreciate them even more, the things they do for me.
And Tokoroa - the old timers and their $5 donations?
It's just amazing for people to support me like that. It helps me stay motivated. This gets pretty expensive - I've been to Australia four times in the past couple of months. Plus there is the grand prix series around New Zealand which can cost as much as going to Australia. It gets pretty tight with mum and dad having to support me and I wouldn't have got to half the places without Tokoroa's support. I go back there to do things to say thank you.
Childhood heroes?
Cathy Freeman. I got her autograph at a Robin Tait meeting on my T-shirt, with others like Toni Hodgkinson's. I've still got the T-shirts.
What's been the high point?
The five golds last weekend would have to go close. I knew I was capable of the 200m and 400m, and the straight final in the 400m eased the workload a bit and gave me a great chance in the 100m.
Low point?
The foot stress fracture in 2005. I was in a cast for six weeks and after I took it off and began to run again, I got pains in my foot. I had to go back into a moon boot. I couldn't even walk properly for about six months.The 2004 world juniors in Italy were also disappointing. I made the 400m semifinals but I had expectations of myself in the 200m and didn't do a good time and missed the semis. I haven't forgotten that. I learned a lot.
* Age: 21.
* Specialty events: 100/200/400m; also regarded by some as an 800m prospect.
* Star performance: Five sprint gold medals at last weekend's national athletics championships in Taranaki.
* Previous form:
National secondary schools champion in 100/200/400m.
Under-20 Australian and New Zealand sprint champion.
World junior semifinalist.
Fourth in the Australian 200m final in 2004-05.
* Awards: Many, including New Zealand Athletics junior sportsperson of the year and Prime Minister's scholarship.
* Aims: Commonwealth and Olympic Games.
