Instagram that sparked NZ’s fastest 800m time since Snell
Sam Tanner slid into James Preston’s direct messages on Instagram to let him know he planned to run the 800m at the New Zealand Track and Field Championships.
“Do you want to pace the first 400m?” Preston replied, according to Tanner.
He said he would check with his coach, “but I think it’s a nah…”
After running an eye-catching 1min 46.1sec PB in Christchurch weeks prior, Tanner, the rising star in New Zealand’s middle distance scene, decided he would do the 800m-1500m double at the national championships.
He had even toyed with the idea of doing the triple and running the 5000m too.
Tanner’s presence in the 800m set up an intriguing showdown against Preston, who was just coming off a 17th placing at the World Indoor Championships in Glasgow.
But the three-time defending champion was not going to let a 1500m runner show him up in his specialist event, especially on his home town track.
Preston decided to go out as hard as he could.
As the heavens opened on a stormy night in Wellington, Preston set a relentless pace in an attempt to drop Tanner.
He went through the first lap in 50.50 seconds.
Tanner, whose tactic was to chase Preston and put him under pressure, hung on for as long as possible.
But the pace was simply too fast. With about 110m to go, as he entered the home straight, Preston turned around and saw Tanner had been dropped.
He looked back once more before storming home to win an epic race in a blistering time of 1min 44.86sec - the first sub 1:45 of his career.
It was quicker than the time that won the gold medal at the Tokyo Olympics but an agonising 0.17sec outside the automatic entry standard for this year’s Paris Olympics.
Notably, it also moved Preston above John Walker into second on New Zealand’s all-time ranking list, behind only the great Peter Snell.
Snell’s legendary 1min 44.3sec was set on grass in 1962 and is the longest standing New Zealand record.
On a weekend where most of the bigname athletes were below their best, Preston’s sizzling 800 was the highlight from the four-day New Zealand Track and Field Championship.
“I didn’t really have a time in mind for the race,” he said. “The goal was just get out and drop Sam and make it hard for him and I guess that’s sort of what happened.
“There was a bit of chatter around the race and sometimes getting fired up is that little 1% that makes you run quicker. No matter who it was, it was nice to have someone quick here.”
Tanner admitted it had been “tense” in the call room before the race but he could only tip his cap to Preston afterwards for rising to the occasion and producing the run of his life with his national title on the line.
“He said something cheeky to me after the race. I’ll paraphrase it in a more appropriate way but he was like it was the only way I was going to beat him today, and yeah it was the best way to beat me,” Tanner said.
“I’m not an 800 guy who is going to run 50 seconds comfortably and he’s just got so much speed it’s amazing. It was cool to see him absolutely hurt me like that and run that fast.
“When your national title is on the line and you have a young dude who is a 1500m runner trying to put the pressure on, it makes him run faster and me run faster. Well potentially not me but it definitely made him run faster and it’s awesome to be in a race where you’re potentially watching history be made.”
After Friday’s fun, Tanner went on to win the 1500m finalyesterday, posting a time of 4min 5.90sec after executing his gameplan to perfection in a tactical duel.
After sitting at the back for the first few laps, Tanner moved to the front with 600m remaining and then put the foot down on the final lap.
He ran a 51.59 sec final 400m, leaving everyone in his wake.