The Athletics Club of the Hutt Valley, New Zealand.
National Teams Competition FinalPorritt Stadium Hamilton Hutt Valley athletes won the third division title at the national interclub track and field league finals held at Hamilton. Though missing several of its leading athletes, the young Valleys United team dominated its division to comfortably secure the third division crown in the revamped league. Valleys team manager Ian Purvis said the result reflected consistent efforts by athletes who were often required to compete in events other than their specialties to score points. "This is an outstanding result from a very young team," Purvis said. "Some of our athletes were only 14 or 15 competing and scoring points in senior ranks. "The club is in a rebuilding phase so this is good encouragement for next season when we hope to do even better." Prominent among the Valleys athletes was world junior sprint representative Tim Hawkes, Upper Hutt middle distance runner Carl Jackson, sprinter Nicole Jenness and field eventer Marissa Pritchard, while the club's relay teams won the men's and women's 4x400m events and the women's 4x100m relay. Jenness and Melanie Cleland were two of the club's 14-year-old athletes to win senior events. Jenness won the senior 100m-200m double while Cleland won the women's 1500m in 4min 51.8sec and was second to clubmate Jacinda Swain in the 800m. Hawkes recorded four wins to be the club's top points scorer over the two days of the meeting. He won the 100m in 11.1sec, the 200m in 22.36sec, his specialist 400m in 52.86sec and added the triple jump (14.27m) for good measure. Jackson, a world university games representative, cantered to the 1500m victory in 3min 55.31sec on Saturday but was pushed harder by his clubmate Neil Sampson in the 800m the following day. Jackson held off a strong challenge to win the shorter distance in 1:57.23sec, just 0.23sec ahead of the teenage Sampson. Pritchard won the women's long jump (5.28m) and high jump (1.63m) but was unfortunately disqualified from the triple jump when she appeared to have set a Wellington centre record, only to find she had overstepped the take-off board on her big effort Full results here.
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