Athletics

I still haven't got around to writing about the ballet show, as promised.  But anyway ...

On Saturday we were at Mt Smart Stadium for the Auckland Athletics Relay Champs.  Mulan was in the Takapuna Club Grade 12 girls team.

This was the first time ever that Mulan had competed in an athletics interclub competition.  (Miya competed last year in the North-West-Central Auckland zone day.)

The girls came third in both the 4x100m and 4x200m, and were awarded bronze medals.  They also competed in the field events relay, where Mulan did the long jump (one girl did shot put and another did discus).

The organisers really don't make it easy for the competitors.  The long jumpers are only allowed one run-through practice before attempting only two competition jumps. (In a normal competition jumpers would have a few practice jumps, and at least three competition jumps.)  Understandably no one is at their best and it means that luck plays a huge part in who is able to hit the board well in one or other of their jumps.  Too many field eventers got two no-throws/jumps.

I really hope that Auckland Athletics organisers consider changing this.  It seems that their motivation is to hurry everything through and finish at lunchtime.  In my opinion it would make for a more genuine competition if they stayed there a bit longer and allowed the children a fair attempt at their best.

Mulan's first jump was well behind the board, and while her second jump was on the board it was off her wrong foot.  At 3.94m, the second jump was her best on the day, though still far from what she can do (in practice she has done around 4.50m).  Nonetheless the other competitors were all in the same boat and Mulan came 4th out of 8.

Combined with the other two Takapuna girls this was good enough to get them another bronze medal.

Congratulations Mulan and the other Takapuna Grade 12 girls!  Awesome effort from all of you!!

The funny thing was that due to a quirk in the points system, had Mulan jumped a bit further in the long jump they would not have got a medal -- they would have been given 4th place.

This was the points table:

So, if Mulan had have got 2nd in the long jump (jumping between 4.00m and 4.21m) then she would have got 8 points (giving Takapuna 18 points) and Waitakere would have got 7 points (giving them 19 points).  So, Papatoetoe would have got 2nd (20 points), Waitakere 3rd (19 points) and Takapuna 4th (18 points).

When I showed this to Mulan she was delighted by her strategically perfect jump!