Paralympians Holly Robinson and Anna Grimaldi will headline a large Otago team at the national track and field championships.
Otago has sent 55 athletes to the championships starting in Wellington today.
Fresh off winning the women’s para shot put at the Sir Graeme Douglas International last weekend, Robinson will compete in the para open shot put and the senior and para javelin.
Grimaldi will line up for the senior 200m and senior long jump.
It will be an important meeting for the pair as they prepare for the world para athletics championships in May and the Paralympics in August.
Becky Aitkenhead, who also produced a stunning 1500m at the Sir Graeme Douglas, will again be in the hunt for the national senior 1500m title, and will lower her distance to compete in the 800m.
Mac Denniston, competing in the para under-20 seated shot put and discus and para under-20 javelin, is another to keep an eye on after she broke national and Otago secondary school records in the past two weeks.
Fellow thrower Alexa Duff continues to make a name for herself and will throw in the under-20 discus and javelin and senior javelin.
Jorja Gibbons, who has been named in the New Zealand under-20 4x100m relay team to compete at the Sydney Track Classic next weekend, will race in the women’s under-20 100m, and Zara Geddes will line up in the under-20 1500m and 5000m.
Todd Bates will want to build on his silver in the senior men’s hammer throw and Cromwell’s Phoebe Laker will step up to the women’s under-16 400m, after she won gold in the women’s under-14 event last year.
National champion Shay Veitch and Felix McDonald will compete in the senior men’s long jump, and McDonald will also run in the senior men’s 100m.
They will also compete in the Otago senior men’s 100m and 400m relay teams, the region entering two teams in each event.
Fergus McLay, John Gerber, Hayato Yoneto, Schuyler Orr, Cameron Moffitt, Jackson Rogers and Finn O’Sullivan will also compete across those teams.
Otago will also compete in the men’s and women’s under-20 100m and 400m relays.
