The arrangement reduced a few opportunities for the all-rounder and potential combined- events athletes. Hurdlers and jumpers were able, because of the evening session, to handle more combinations.
Whanganui High School hurdler Maggie Jones, who is preparing for her first heptathlon, would have liked to be able to add a throwing event at the school championships but she was able to sprint, hurdle and jump. Last week the New Zealand under-20 400m hurdles winner and silver 100m hurdler was an impressive winner over 300m and 100m hurdles. In the evening session this week, she won both the long jump (4.94m) and high jump (1.55m). Jones added the 100m in the daytime sprint session and finished second to Paige Cromarty (Girls' College) in the 200m. Cromarty had shared the New Zealand 400m podium earlier in the month. Cromarty ran under 27 seconds for the first time (26.69 seconds), helped by the strong tailwind.
In a championship that restricted so many combinations, Jones emerged as the leading senior athlete with her five wins and one second. Only Year 9 athlete Juliet McKinlay (Whanganui Collegiate School) won more with a similar combination. McKinlay won the 70m and 300m junior hurdles last week, added the 100m-200m double around lunchtime, and won the high jump and long jump in the evening.
With a meeting that finished at only 8.15pm on Tuesday, some 14 hours before submitting this column, there can only be a small snapshot of the action over the five sessions. I will return for a deeper analysis next week.
More than 50 per cent of athletes competing were from Whanganui High School and Whanganui Collegiate School so, not unexpectedly, they featured strongly in the results. It was pleasing to see Rangitīkei College and Ruapehu College with especially strong results in the throws session.
The athletics revival at Whanganui High School has continued, winning the most titles and shading their near neighbours Whanganui Collegiate with notably good results from their sprinters, while Whanganui Collegiate impressed in the distance events with 12 titles. In the throwing events, eight titles were won by High School with Rangitīkei College winning four and Collegiate and Ruapehu three each.
Not unexpectedly, athletes who had been successful at the New Zealand Track and Field Championships at the start of the month in Hastings impressed at Cooks Gardens.
Whanganui Collegiate School athletics captain Jack Dai, who had taken a bronze in the under-20 triple jump, won both the senior long and triple in the evening, saving the best to last with an excellent triple jump series, winning with a 12.86 effort and, more importantly, nailed his run-up. Dai was an unexpected winner over 200m, finishing just 0.04 of a second ahead of Nat Kirk (High School) on his return from injury.
The senior 100m was even closer with only seven one-hundredths of a second separating the top three, with Theo Almazan (High School) closely followed by Coby Pye (High School) and Dai.
The leading middle-distance runners who had been at the New Zealand championships did not appreciate the gnarly Cooks Gardens wind. James Hercus won the 800m in 2:01.0, a couple of seconds down on his national performance. Toby Caro, who has set a PB almost every time he has stepped on the track, took the intermediate boys title well shy of his best time.
Louise Brabyn, who had won the New Zealand under-18 steeples in Hastings and sliced 18 seconds off her 3000m time for bronze, not unexpectedly won the Whanganui steeples last week and continued her good form in the 1500m where she took seven seconds off her best with a national class performance (4:41.97), which was statistically the best performance of the day in far-from-favourable conditions.
Next week's column will return to the schools championships.
