Auckland Children's Athletics Champs

On Saturday, Mulan and Miya competed at the Auckland Children's Athletics Champs at Mount Smart Stadium.

Covid changed the setup this year, as under the Red Light system everyone needs to keep in bubbles of under 100.  Consequently, they're holding it over four days, and the boys and girls are separated to opposite ends of the stadium.  Saturday was Day 2, and it was just for the 10-14s.

They also restricted spectators to under 100, though as I was officiating at the girls' end shot put I had more freedoms (and a free lunch!).

Sadly, this year there were fewer competitors, though there were still many excellent athletes and impressive performances.  At the shot put we measured three new records (from five grades).

Mulan, competing for the final time as a Grade 14, had a slow start to the day with her four events.  But it picked up at the end with a couple of awesome performances.

First up she did long jump.  Some days go better than others, and this was one of the unlucky days.  She got two no jumps, so on her third and final jump she wisely played it safe to make sure she got a distance in.  Her 4.12m was well short of her usual performances, but gave her enough to earn a bronze medal.  (An average jump for her would have got silver.)

Second, her shot put of 7.77m was average for her, but earned her 5th place.

Third, she got a new PB in the discus, getting it out to a very pleasing 23.07m and earning another 5th place.

Finally, she finished off with a PB of 14.53sec in the 80m hurdles and earned herself another bronze medal.  This was especially pleasing because for the first time she got fewer strides between the hurdles all the way through the race.  Up until now she has had to put in an extra stride between most hurdles, meaning that she mostly had to alternate lead legs.  But this time she had the power to keep going, keep the strides long, and keep the same lead leg for the entire distance.  The end result was that she improved her time by 0.2 seconds.

Miya, competing in Grade 11, was on fire for both her events, and had two new PBs.

Her shot put was a huge 8.30m, earning her 4th place.

Earlier in the week we decided to experiment with Miya's discus style, and she had a go at the spin.  It was starting to work well in practice, so she decided to try it in the comp.  Happily she got a good one in, pushing the discus out to a new PB of 17.58m and earning her 5th place.

The field results are here, and the track result here.

Miya's favourite event, high jump, is happening this Saturday coming, on the fourth and final day of the competition.

Climbing out the stiffness

After a weekend of athletics, the muscles were (and are) stiff and sore.

A bit of climbing this morning loosened things slightly:

Athletics Auckland Champs: Final day

Our final day of competition was a busy one.  Mulan's first event was at 9am, which meant leaving home at 8am.

The good news for us was that we got over the Harbour Bridge before high winds closed the road at 9:30.  But it was bad luck for a few North Shore athletes who got stuck in traffic going the long way around and were late for their events.

The gusting wind was also tough for competing, with some events getting over 8 m/s.

Mulan was lucky with the wind during her triple jump.  Her first jump had a tail wind of only 0.1 m/s, and she equaled her legal jump PB of 9.58m.  Her second jump had a tail wind of 5.3 m/s, and she got a huge wind assisted PB of 9.80m.

This was good enough to earn her third place in the Under 16 Women's competition.  Covid Red Level meant that there were no medal presentations on the day; we were told that medals will be sent to the clubs.  We're pretty sure that Mulan will be awarded a silver medal, as the first place getter is from out of Auckland.

It was also a great for Mulan's Interprovincial competition.  Mulan's triple jump counted both for her individual event and also for the team relay.

Mulan then immediately dashed off to her next event, the 80m hurdles.  The two heats were a timed final, and Mulan's 14.87sec fourth place in the first heat was good enough to get her seventh place overall.

I took the video from the competition area, as while Mulan was running I was setting up for my triple jump.  I was stiff and sore from six long jumps the day before, but I managed to hold it together enough to jump 10.58m for first place in the Masters Men's 45-49.

Finally, Mulan finished off with a 400m run.  She wouldn't normally run 400m at Auckland Champs, but she had to get a performance in for the Interprovincials and this was her only opportunity.  In challenging conditions her 1:12.63 was a solid time and gained her 12th place.

The results are here.

Athletics Auckland Champs: Long Jump

The athletics Auckland Champs are on.

Today Mulan and I were at Mount Smart Stadium, where we both competed in the long jump.

Mulan's 4.41m gained her 6th place in the Women's Under 16 grade:

And my 5.14m gained me 1st place in the Masters Men's 45-49 grade:

The results are here.

We're back in action tomorrow morning!

Back to climbing

We did very little climbing over Christmas/New Year; there's only so many hours in the day, and athletics/holidays/music seemed to take most of them.

We've been slowly derusting, and toughening up the hands.  Today we videoed a few greens.

Here's Alex the chalk bag, who Miya got for her birthday.  (She also got her third pair of climbing shoes -- she's growing too fast!)

Romeo and Juliet ballet

Two postponements, but it finally happened this weekend.

Back in April last year Mulan and Miya joined The Classical Collab's ballet production of Romeo and Juliet.

Last year they were supposed to have weekly rehearsals followed by three shows in September.  But then Covid lockdown happened, and it was postponed to November, and then postponed again to this weekend.

Finally it was able to go ahead, and the wait was worth it!  The girls (and a few guys) put on a wonderful show!  Mulan, in the senior group, was a Capulet cousin, while Miya, in the juniors, was a Montague.

If you missed it, there's a few videos up on their YouTube channel, including the trailer.

They had one performance on Friday night and then two yesterday, while the dress rehearsal on Thursday night was videoed.  We were at the final show last night.

Both Mulan and Miya have applied to join their next production, Reframe, which looks like it's going to be contemporary ballet.

Miya has been so inspired by this production that she decided to restart ballet lessons this year (she took a break last year from ballet and just did contemporary dance), so she can join the seniors in a couple of years.