Athletics: Changing order proves decisive

Sabrina Grogan, a member of the winning Hill City team, negotiates a downhill section during the...
Sabrina Grogan, a member of the winning Hill City team, negotiates a downhill section during the cross-country relays at the Dunedin Pony Club grounds at Three Mile Hill on Saturday. Photo by Linda Robertson.
Re-arranging the order of its runners proved a master-stroke when Hill City-University dominated the senior men's event at the cross-country relays at the Dunedin Pony Club grounds on Saturday.

Team captain Oli Chignell said they decided to rearrange the running order to better utilise the strengths within the team.

The plan had an immediate impact when Kirk Madgwick held out strong challenges from the club's No 2 team and the top two Caversham teams.

Madgwick was embroiled in a toe-to-toe battle with clubmate Andy Pohl and the Caversham pair of Jake Jackson-Grammer and Alex Dodds, but eventually put some real estate on that trio over the final stages of the 2650m lap course and set the scene for Jared Monk, Chignell and Sam Bremer to do the business.

Oli Chignell.
Oli Chignell.
Monk maintained the advantage to hand Chignell a handy 22sec lead at the change for the penultimate third leg.

The talented junior was quickly into his stride and wasted little time in extending the lead to more than a minute by the midway stage of the loop, before handing Bremer an unassailable lead to finish off.

"Once you got moving it was quite easy,'' Chignell said, describing the wet conditions.

"It was very slippery in parts, especially over the back part of the course. The uphill piece on the first part of the course was pretty dry. It was a lot drier than I was expecting. But once you got down to the top end of the course is where it got really boggy.''

Chignell added that it was quite a technical course and one more suited to a more lightly built runner.

"It was the sort of course where you had to be very aware of where you were placing your feet.''

As Chignell's Hill City-University team was running away with victory, a battle royal was taking place for the minor places among the top two Caversham teams and a second Hill City-University team.

Blair Martin and Alex Dodds featured for the Caversham No2 team as it was pipped into third place in the final stage, after a gutsy come-from-behind run from Jonah Smith, competing for the Caversham No1 team.

The Caversham teams held out the threat posed by a talented Hill City-University No2 team, which finished fourth.

Coming on the heels of its victory at the Lovelock Relays three weeks ago, a golden future looks assured for the Hill City-University Club.

The average age of its Chignell-led senior team on Saturday was just 19 years.

Next weekend will be a step up for Chignell (18) as he will contest the half marathon section of the Christchurch Marathon, while on June 25 both he and Bremer will contest the Queenstown Mile.

Jean Kozyniak wasted no time in getting her Hill City-University senior women's team away to a flying start.

Kozyniak hit her straps early, putting daylight into second before handing over to Bella Bloomfield for the second leg of the 4x2000m event.

Bloomfield was left unchecked on the second leg as, too, were Shireen Crumpton and Sabrina Grogan on the remaining two, as Grogan brought the team home triumphant.

"I was really pleased with how all the girls ran on a pretty horrible day like today,'' Grogan said of the teams' victory, adding that "muddy'' would best describe the course conditions.

"Actually, it's a really nice course. Proper bit of cross-country,'' she said.

Grogan and Crumpton were both podium finishers at the New Zealand mountain running championships in Queenstown two weeks ago, when Crumpton finished second and Grogan third.

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