Athletics: 'Flying whippet' brings home medals

Ricky White's hero is Usain Bolt, the Olympic sprint champion and world record holder.

White (18), a pupil at Sara Cohen School, was a bolt out of the blue himself when he won two gold medals and a silver in AWD (athletes with disabilities) events at the New Zealand secondary schools athletics championships in Timaru last weekend.

The "flying whippet" excelled in the sprints when he was runner-up in the 100m (13.03sec) and won the 200m (26.38sec) and 400m (63.36sec).

This was a remarkable performance because it was his first taste of athletics at the national level.

White has a picture of Bolt on his bedroom wall.

"Every time I look at him before competitions I tell myself that I want to be like him," White said.

"I watched him on television when he won the Olympic gold medals."

The three medals he won will be hung on his bedroom wall beside the picture of Bolt.

It was an elated White who returned to Sara Cohen School this week and used its engraving machine to put his name on the medals.

"I did it myself so I didn't have to pay for it," White quipped.

He is the first pupil from Sara Cohen to win national titles.

It was a special day for Sarah Cohen when White displayed his medals at the school this week.

"I just kept smiling," White said.

"I was very proud."

It was his first experience competing at a major athletics championships with 1300 competitors and a red-hot atmosphere.

"I was nervous at first," White said.

"But it was fun."

White first realised he had athletics talent when he dominated the AWD sprints at the Otago and Southland secondary schools championships at the end of last season.

It has given him huge confidence in himself and the realisation that he can compete in open competition.

White's next target is to compete in mainstream athletics and he is confident that he can foot it with the "big boys".

His coach, Mike Weddell, believes White has the potential to excel at the higher level of athletics.

"Ricky has huge potential," Weddell said.

"He runs a quick 400m and has raced two half-marathons."

White ran 1hr 32min in the Moro half-marathon and 1hr 30sec in the Hill Free event.

"He doesn't train for long-distance events but he does a pamphlet drop in South Dunedin each morning before school," Weddell said.

But his most telling statistic is his 200m time of 26sec that gives him the potential to match the best middle-distance runners.

"I get him to jog a few laps of the track after speed work and he runs round the 400m in 70sec," Weddell said.

"It is very hard to hold him back."

The other notable performances by Otago athletes in AWD events came from Matt Aitken (OBHS) who won four medals - gold in the javelin (19.85m), silver in the discus (25.76m) and bronze medals in the 100m (15.36sec) and 200m (31.51sec).

David Takerei (Kings) won silver medals in the 100m (15.11sec) and 400m (67.12sec) and bronze in the 200m (31.91sec).