Great numbers for road champs
It was great to see the big numbers competing in the Athletics Manawatuwanganui road championships last Saturday.
I was impressed to see close to a hundred competitors running out of the Esplanade car park as the 10km races began.
The afternoon started with the 8-year-old 1km race, where Feilding Moa’s Millie Evans came in ahead of the Palmerston North duo of Taylor Trow and Stella Groube.
Toby Johnson from Manawatu Striders was the first male finisher.
The 10-year-old grade competed over 2km and Reuben Duker (Moa) was first home, with his team-mate Hayley Cornwall the first female home, finishing ahead of Kylah Gunn and Amber Trow, both from PNAHC.
There was more success for the Feilding Moas in the 3km races with Nelson Doolan winning the boys 12 title, Bella Ives the girls 12 title and Liam Wall the boys 14 title.
Sam Mackinder (PNAHC) won the girls 14 event, heading off teammate Ashleigh Gunn.
Ben Wall made it a family double, winning the junior 5km race from Leo Purdy,
Sian Cass was the first masters athlete to finish their 5km race.
David Lovelock took the senior men’s 10km title, finishing well clear of Chris Sanson, with Will O’connor third.
Juanita Paterson won the women’s title.
Bradyn Popow competed in his first 10km walk and he won the centre title, holding off Sue Hoskin, who took the women’s title.
One name that was missing from the results was Tessa Webb, who was representing New Zealand at the Australian cross-country championships in Canberra. Tessa finished a creditable 12th. She was happy with her run, saying she ran harder than ever and suffered afterwards.
A great experience for her first international competition.
There were some great performances by Manawatu athletes who travelled to Masterton to compete in the third meeting of the winter track series.
Manawatu athletes made up a large proportion of those competing.
The top performance of the meeting was undoubtedly the 100m run of Zac Topping, who recorded an outstanding 10.89s, finishing well clear of the rest of the field.
Jordan Peters finishing third in 11.46s.
The women’s 100m was an allmanawatu affair, with Vanessa Storey winning in 13.40s, Pavinee Watson was second 13.57 and Monique Whiteman third in 13.68s
The series points leader, Lea Meutzel, continued to score good points, clearing 1.57m to win the women’s high jump, with Renae Savill second with a 1.47m clearance.
Other Manawatu athletes Georgia Whiteman, Sam Mackinder and Ariana Blackwood all clearing 1.42m
The men’s high jump went to Mark Seumanu, with a 1.77m clearance.
Jordan Peters, a former national high jump runnerup, was having a bit of fun clearing 1.72m, before opting out of the competition to compete in the long jump, where he leaped a very impressive 6.82m.
Pavinee Watson was best of the women with a 4.85m leap.
Jack Lewer won the men’s discus with a 28.57m throw and he followed this up with an 8.86m effort with the 7.25kg shot put.
Mark Seumanu got the lighter 5kg shot out to 9.42m.
The women’s shot went to Ariana Blackwood with a 9.81m effort with the 4kg shot, heading off Monique Whiteman whose best effort got the 3kg shot out to 8.97m.
Vanessa Storey finished off a good day of competition, running 62.23s to win the 400m ahead of Monique Whiteman’s 66.23s .
Georgia Whiteman and Courtney Walsh combined well, running 57.67s as a 2x200m relay team .
It was good to see both Ben and Liam Wall competing in the 1500m after their successes in the road championships the day before.
Athletics New Zealand must be happy with the results from the Rio Olympics.
A silver and three bronze medals was a great result.
The value of these medals to the sport will be immense and I am hopeful the successes will have a big spin off.
Of interest is the actual value of the medals based on their composition.
The Olympic gold medal is actually made up of 98.8 per cent silver, with a gold plating only making up 1.2 per cent of the 500g medal.
Based on the metal composition the medal’s value would be $565.
The 1912 Stockholm Games was the last time solid gold medals were awarded.
By today’s values, a solid gold medal would be worth $21,200.
The silver medal is made entirely of silver and quite interestingly about 30 per cent of the silver used for the Rio medals was obtained from recycled material.
The metal composition value of these medals is $315.
The bronze medal comprised of 95 per cent copper and 5 per cent zinc, with 40 per cent of the copper sourced from the waste copper from the Brazilian Mint’s coin-making process.
The monetary value of this medal is only $2.38.