South Canterbury athletes competed with outstanding success at the 2010 New Zealand track and field championships in Christchurch, winning three titles.
The gold medal haul at QEII Park was boosted by five silver and five bronze medals.
Leading the charge was Daniel Lord who took out the men’s 19 walking double, winning both the 3000 metres in 13 minutes 34.11 seconds and 10,000m in 49min 26.14sec.
Tom Walsh won his first New Zealand senior men’s title in the shot put.
The event was won by the Frenchman Daniel Kilama but Walsh was the best Kiwi with a 16.21m effort.
He backed his titles up by winning two silver medals, in the men’s 19 discus, with a personal best of 49.09m, and the age-group shot put, with a distance of 18.65m.
The latter was a thrilling contest, with 15-year-old Jacko Gill from Auckland winning the title on his last throw with a fine effort of 19.92m. That set New Zealand records in both the men’s 18 and 19 grades.
Gill was too young under the rules to compete in the senior ranks.
Nicola Mackle won her first senior New Zealand medal, finishing third in the high jump with a 1.66m leap.
Mackle also finished second in the women’s 19 high jump, clearing 1.72m, and took out the bronze medal in the long jump with a personal best of 5.48m.
She was unlucky to clip the bar on her first attempt at 1.76m in the high jump.
Mackle may well have won the long jump had she hit the board spot on, as her distance could have been beyond 5.70m. Her 5.48m effort earned her the top age-group ranking, however, as the jumps of the competitors who beat her were wind-assisted.
Rebecca Hodgson was in excellent form in the hammer, taking silver medals in both the women’s 19 with a new Canterbury record of 47.01m and 45.82m in the women’s 16 event.
Lucinda Shaw also struck silver in the women’s 19 3000m track walk in 15min 41.86sec.
In the women’s 16 high jump clubmates Toya Te Kapa and Lee-Anne McKenzie had a great contest to finish third equal and both were awarded bronze medals after clearing 1.66m.
It was a personal best for Te Kapa and she was the only athlete apart from the winner who went close to clearing 1.70m.
The silver medal went to an athlete clearing the same height as her and McKenzie but the second place-getter got over at the first attempt, whereas the South Canterbury athletes cleared it on their second.
The other bronze medal was won by Michael Dewar in the men’s 16 hammer with a 40.11m effort.
The other excellent performance by a local athlete was Brent Clifford’s effort in the men’s 16 800m, where he reduced his personal best by three seconds to finish fifth in 1min 57.94sec. He also finished sixth in the 1500m in 4min 10.69sec.
