Taylor Hall is a standout at last week’s meet (file photo).
Easter Saturday and Sunday saw most of the country’s top 12- and 13-year-old athletes competing on the Manawatū Community Athletic Track, as the city hosted the Athletics New Zealand 12- and13 years Interprovincial Teams Event. They certainly did not disappoint with the stadium listing of the best performances on the track for 12- and 13-year-olds needing to be almost completely rewritten after the completion of the competition with 26 new records being established. All competitors were required to compete in both track and field events, with points being accumulated by their performances. At the end of the two days, Canterbury proved to be the top scoring team with Auckland second and Wellington third.
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These athletes will now have to focus on the Manawatū and North Island secondary school championships. ♦ The masters athletes were more fortunate because their national championships were last weekend in Inglewood, and only the final day needed to be adjusted to meet Covid-19 regulations. Brayden Grant performed well, winning gold medals in the M35 grade in the 60m, 100m, 200m, 400m and 800m events. His winning time in the 400m of 50.16 seconds was a national record. Andrew Matsuoka Webber was second in the 100m, 200m and 400m races. Hayden Robinson won the M40 400m and was third in the 100m and 200m races.
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There has now been 69 sub-four-minute miles completed on the track. Benjamin Wall did not go with the early pace, but led the chasing bunch home, finishing very strongly for fifth place in 4m 3.95s. This was a personal best and a good indication he could be the first Palmerston North athlete. Noah Macdermid also achieved a big personal best, coming home 11th in 4m 10.22s. The meeting got off to a good start for Palmerston North, with Chayille Collette running a personal best of 12.39s in winning the women’s 100 metres. Later in the evening she ran another personal best of 25.39s, finishing second in the 200m.