NEWCOMER: The in-form Liam Black leads George Lambert at the Wanganui Collegiate School Inter House event. PHOTO/Rob van Dort
Over the past fortnight I have once again been reminded how lucky we are to have the world class facility of Cooks Gardens right in the heart of the city.
On six occasions I have been down at the track opening the gear shed for school groups using the facility. All but one of these groups were local schools with sons and daughters of local ratepayers getting value from a major city asset.
The other group from Westmount School Hawera were not local but did bring some economic benefit to our community. Similarly the large group of parents of Collegiate boarders attending who flocked to The Inter House evening in late February spent significant dollars over the weekend in the city.
If the athletic club nights for children on Monday and older athletes are added to the mix over the past 13 days, the track has been used for competition on 11 occasions with training in all the other days.
This weekend sees the Relay for Life over a 12 hour period on Saturday.
The individual schools events ended yesterday with the Whanganui High School Championships. All the schools will be deliberating over the results and selecting teams in the three age grades for the Whanganui Secondary Schools Track and Field Championships to be held at Cooks Gardens next Wednesday with an afternoon and evening session.
The evening session has the majority of the track finals with an action-packed three hours from 5.30pm. The Whanganui Schools is the selection meeting for the final event of the season, the North Island Schools Championships in Inglewood on April 8-9.
The Children's Club nights on Mondays have flourished under the outstanding organization from Jodie Brunger. The younger children are in action from 4pm with a wide variety of varied activities for our younger children and activities and competition and coaching for the older children at 6pm.
The evening is active and dynamic and the fine weather this Monday saw a record attendance. There has from this been an encouraging growth in membership reflected further with a group from the athletes attending the children's Manawatu/Wanganui Centre Championships on Sunday in Palmerston North.
Brunger is helped by the newly-appointed Community Sports Adviser for Athletics and Harriers, Georgia Black. Parents and volunteers have been encouraged to help and this will grow further as Black moves fully into the new role.
There is a strong likelihood that this resurgence will be reflected in secondary schools next year which will hopefully reduce the club's reliance on Wanganui Collegiate School for older membership.
The weather gods were not so kind on Tuesday with cold damp and windy conditions at the weekly senior club night. Many voted with their feet and did not come but the excellent efforts from the reduced fields highlighted the wisdom of the policy of not cancelling. Athletes will from time encounter inclement conditions at major national and international events and wet cold club nights can positively prepare and empower athletes.
Emma Osborne, featured last week, once again excelled with a personal best 300 metres in 41.59 which moves her to number two on the Collegiate all- time list. This provides a confidence boost for the 14-year-old 10 days out from her first Athletic New Zealand Championships where she will run over the under 18 400 metres
Harry Symes again looked good in poor conditions over both 400 metres and 1100 metres. Symes will run at the New Zealand Championships and in the Australian Championships at the end of March.
It is good to see both the commitment and hard work from two junior sprinters Wayne Yang (Collegiate) and Maysin Katene (High School) who aim to follow in the Symes footsteps.
Young middle distance runner Liam Back who has joined Collegiate School from St Peters College Auckland in Year 11 looks the real deal.
Over the past month he has bettered all his times over all his middle distances events. He will run Steeples and 800 metres in the under 18 grade, a grade at the New Zealand Championships and a grade he will still be in two years from now.
On Tuesday evening Back had a speed outing over 400 metres and followed this with a totally relaxed run over 1500 metres as a warm down.
In the 1500 metres won by Back on Tuesday it was good to see personal best from both George Lambert (4:43.12) and his sister Sarah (5:14,98) with Marseille Bowie rewarded for her hard work with a 5:18.92 personal best. In the field Phoebe Collier got the shot out to 10.04 and Lexi Maples handled the wet conditions with an 11 metre effort.