Next Tuesday, January 14, is the first official club night on the resurfaced track with a training session. The following Tuesday sees the standard A programme (100m, 400m, 1500m, shot, and long jump) providing a dress rehearsal for the Pak’nSave Cooks Classic on Saturday, January 25.
First out training on the new track was New Zealand representative and former national hurdle title winner Jonathan Maples who will compete in the 400m hurdles, the first event of the Cooks Gardens Classic evening programme.
Maples has trained well but has missed a fortnight’s training with medical issues. He is back and is confident he will be ready for the Classic.
As well as strong hurdlers from outside of the region, Maples will be joined by Whanganui’s Damian Hodgson who will represent New Zealand Schools following his schools title in Timaru in early December. The schools team, selected after the Timaru New Zealand Schools Championship, is touring to the three lower North Island classic meets (Cooks Classic, Capital Classic in Wellington on January 29 and Potts Classic on February 1).
The Cooks Classic has enhanced status with five events on the programme elevated to World Athletics Bronze level.
The Classic already has athletes from seven countries entered, with strong fields in the traditional women’s and men’s mile which doubles as the Athletics New Zealand Championship.
Sam Tanner will be seeking his fifth Cooks Gardens sub-4-minute mile and his successive sub-4-minute mile win at Cooks Gardens.
Olympic and World Indoor high jump champion Hamish Kerr makes a return to Cooks Gardens where, on three consecutive years, he set stadium records. Kerr currently holds the record at 2.28m (he narrowly missed 2.31m last year).
He will not be the only Olympic gold medal winner at the Classic, with para gold medallist Anna Grimaldi competing in the 100m. Kerr and Grimaldi not only share Paris gold medals but are also strong Halberg nominees.
I will return to the Cooks Classic over the next two weeks' Insight articles.
Local officials will have no time to relax and reflect on the Classic as they will be back in action at the club three days later, and again the following Sunday for the athletics section of the New Zealand Masters Games when masters athletes from throughout New Zealand and beyond will have the pleasure of competing on the sparkling new surface.
Whanganui hosts the first week of the Manawatū/Whanganui Centre Championships on Tuesday, February 11, as part of the normal A Club programme. The second week of the championships is on Tuesday, February 18, in Palmerston North.
The championships are important as they are prerequisites for selection as part of the MWA team travelling south to the Athletics New Zealand Championships in Dunedin (March 6-9).
Many Whanganui athletes are likely to travel to Hamilton to compete in the popular Porritt Classic on Saturday, February 15. The event always draws many athletes from Auckland and the Waikato and, by its inclusion of school-age events, makes the journey north worthwhile for athletes from beyond the Waikato and Auckland region.
Our own school-age athletes will have Tuesday, March 18, already fixed in their diaries as the Whanganui Secondary Schools Championships is their major goal.
The busy daytime schools programme covers most athletics disciplines with only the hammer, 2000m steeples and 300m hurdles held the following Tuesday.
The Whanganui Secondary Schools Championships is also a selection meeting for the Whanganui team to the North Island Secondary Schools at Porritt Stadium in Hamilton (Saturday and Sunday, April 5-6).
Exciting times lie ahead for athletes with the resurfaced Cooks Gardens at the centre of the action. The full programme for the months ahead is posted on the Athletics Whanganui website.
I will be closely following athletic events, both local and national, through the Insight column.
