By TERRY MADDAFORD
The dollars suggest New Zealand yachtsmen and women are under the most pressure to perform in Athens.
Of the 18 sports in which New Zealand will compete, Yachting New Zealand has, by far, the greatest share of Sport and Recreation New Zealand's funding cake.
By the end of Sparc's 2
1/2-year funding period to December this year, yachties will have received $3.2 million. They will have already pocketed another $191,500 in personal grants for the July 2002-July 2004 period.
That is $1 million more than the next-best supported sport.
The New Zealand Equestrian Federation will receive $2. 1 million - with another $45,500 in personal grants. A total of $944,500 has already been paid in personal grants within the total of $17,367,360 pitched at Olympic success.
The national bodies of sports with high expectations - cycling, rowing and triathlon - will all have more than $1 million to spend, while their athletes have received another $449,500 in individual grants.
Basketball and hockey, with teams in the men's and women's competitions, have also had more than $1 million support from the Government agency, but with no personal grants. At the other end of the Sparc scale, archery received nothing, taekwondo was "ineligible" and fencing just $10,000.
If the 150-strong team return from Greece with eight medals as a Herald straw poll suggests - and that would be double the return from Sydney four years ago - they will have cost more than $2 million each.
The cold facts might suggest that as being a poor return. But ask any of the 54 New Zealanders who have had a gold medal (or medals) hung around their neck how they value them and the answer, surely, would be "priceless".
