New athletics season looms

Classy athlete Tayla Brunger (2013) is back from injury and working back to the fitness that won her and team mate Sophie Redmayne (2048) 4x400m record-breaking relay gold at the NZSS in December.

Even though the wet winter does not seem to go away the longer early evenings remind us that summer is not too far away.

Another indication of the approach of summer is the increase in the number of young athletes training at Cooks Gardens as many winter sports come to the end of their season. This number will certainly increase further when the Secondary Schools Tournament Week involving large numbers in many codes ends on September 8.

In helping athletes plan their training for the coming season it has become apparent that time is limited for many school age athletes. Tournament Week ends later in September than usual and the major New Zealand Secondary Schools Track and Field and Road Race Championships will be held on the weekend starting December 1 (the earliest possible week) effectively reducing preparation time by almost a fortnight.

This will inevitably mean that top athletes involved in Tournament Week will have a shorter transition post winter sport prior to commencing a build up to their major event in the first half of the 2017-2018 season.

This provides a challenge but not one that is unsurmountable.

Among those at the track on Tuesday it was good to see Sam Merson and Luke Foster at Cooks Gardens. Both were members of the winning Wanganui Collegiate School 4x100m relay team and both are in their first year out of school.

Merson is an outstanding relay runner who not only took gold in the Collegiate 4x100m team, but also came in as a reserve to take gold in the Manawatu/Whanganui senior 4x400m team.

Merson is now at Massey University and has the opportunity while in Palmerston North to work with leading coach George McConachy at the Massey track.

Foster has just completed a successful debut season in senior rugby and will hopefully realize that sprints on the track and the associated speed work pays dividends in winter. Foster finished fourth in the New Zealand Secondary Schools 100 metres last December (one place higher than Waisake Nahola did in his final secondary schools year).

One young athlete looking forward to the summer more than most will be Tayla Brunger. The 15-year-old won the New Zealand Secondary Schools junior 400 metres last December while still in Year 9.

In winning the one lap race she went to third in the New Zealand under 18 rankings and also broke the Collegiate senior record that had stood since 1991. Brunger won the Colgate 400 metre event in January in pain with a serious injury that saw her miss all events in the second half of the season.

In the intervening period she has seen her Collegiate record fall to the older and experienced Grace Godfrey and also seen a challenge from her record-breaking NZ Schools winning 4x400m team mate Emma Osborne, who won the North Island Schools Intermediate 400m in April.

Brunger has worked hard on her rehabilitation, even dropping netball, a sport she loves, to allow full rehabilitation. Recent training and test results demonstrate that the rehabilitation has gone well notably including an impressive Kosmin test where she ran twice over a minute with a three minute rest. Brunger produced an excellent predictive result and confidence lifting performance. Her strength and endurance is back and her speed is progressing well.

Brunger joins a small group of local athletes who will be applying for selection for the 32-strong New Zealand Schools under 18 who will travel to compete in the Australian Schools Championships in Adelaide a week after the New Zealand event in Hastings in December.

This tour provides a wonderful opportunity for New Zealand school aged athletes and is a timely reminder that athletes must apply for this no later than September 10. This deadline is a further reminder that summer is not far away.

It is refreshing to hear from young athletes as they plan for the season that they are excited and are looking forward with excitement to the months ahead. I look forward to seeing more old faces, and hopefully some new ones, at Cooks Gardens in the weeks ahead.