Women's sprinting in Otago has livened up since the arrival of Aucklander Brooke Cull in Dunedin.
Cull (20), the fifth-ranked women's 200m sprinter in the country, demonstrated her power at the Caledonian Ground on Saturday.
Cull won the senior women's race in a time of 25.13sec, close to the personal-best time she ran at the Otago championships a week earlier.
Larissa Dyke (Taieri) sped out of the blocks but was not able to hold Cull when she powered around the bend into the straight, and settled for second place in 26.94sec.
The battle between Cull and Dyke is expected to rejuvenate senior women's sprinting in Otago.
Dyke has faster speed, which she demonstrated when winning the 100m in 12.34sec.
Cull has more endurance and is ranked seventh in the country in the 400m this year with 56.49sec.
She was educated at Takapuna Grammar and represented New Zealand at the Oceania championships in 2012.
Cull won the South-East Regional Conference 400m when she spent a year at Wingate University in the United States.
She is studying sociology and psychology at the University of Otago this year.
The best junior sprinter was Christina Ashton (Taieri), who won the women's 15 to 17 100m in 12.77sec and the 200m in 26.78sec. She also won the 100m hurdles in 15.17sec.
World masters 400m champion Liz Wilson (Hill City-University) lowered the Otago 50-54 record in the 100m to 13.30sec.
The Taieri team of Nadia Lyders, Joccoaa Palmer, Leonie Palmer and Mikalya Thorn broke the Otago girls aged 15 record in the 4x100m relay with a time of 52.79sec.
Hannah Ashton (Taieri) broke a 26-year-old age group high jump record when she jumped 1.54m on her 13th birthday.
The old record of 1.45m was set by Trudy Pringle (Taieri) in 1988.
Sam Porter (Taieri) won the junior men's aged 18 and 19 javelin with a throw of 47.36m.
Hugh McLeod-Jones (Hill City-University) won the youth aged 15-17 javelin with 52.52m.
Ian Craven (Hill City-University) continued his good form when he finished runner-up in the masters men's pole vault with 2.60m.
A week earlier, in Auckland, Craven won his first national title in the New Zealand men's aged 55-59 decathlon with a personal-best score of 4388m.
Wayne Doyle (Otago) was runner-up in the New Zealand men's aged 50-54 championship with 6246 points,Paul Davies (Taieri), who was third on Saturday with his pole vault of 2.40m, was third in Auckland with 3961 points.
His daughter Danica Davies (Taieri) was third in the youth women's section in Auckland with 4091 points.
• Tauranga hurdler Michael Cochrane broke the New Zealand record for the 400m hurdles while winning the event at the Perth Classic meeting yesterday. Cochrane (22) lowered the record to an impressive 49.72sec, 0.18sec under the previous record of 49.90sec set by another Waikato Bay of Plenty athlete, Nic O'Brien, in 2003, APNZ reported.
