Robert Jopp (Hill City) took off like a frightened rabbit, got ahead of the bunch and stayed there to won the 21st annual Time Buster around the Octagon, in Dunedin, on Saturday.
Jopp (16), third last year, won in a time of 33.93sec. Blair Grant (Taieri) was second in 34.52sec and last year's winner, Ben Jowsey (Hill City), was third in 35.13sec.
The women's winner was New Zealand secondary schools representative Sophie Napper (Taieri), who was competing in the event for the first time.
She won in 38.86sec from Jasmine Ng (40.32sec) and Danielle Geldeman (40.87sec).
The 243m street race starts outside the New Zealand Shop when the Dunedin Town Hall clock strikes the first of its 10 strokes at 10am. The aim is to reach the finish before the clock strikes 10.
Jopp was first to the top of the hill by the Robbie Burns statue and was able to get the inside running down the hill to the Regent Theatre and control the race.
"I could hear footsteps behind me and I knew the others were close," Jopp said.
He hurtled down the slope and had a 10m lead as they passed the Regent and headed for home.
He was confident at this stage but knew he still had some hard work to do. There is so much force going through a sprinter's legs on the downhill that it is difficult to stay tall and keep running form after that.
"The bottom was the hardest part of the race for me," he said.
He desperately moved up the slope to the finish but was 4m short of his target as the Town Hall clock struck 10 and failed by less than half a second to collect the bonus payment of $250 to add to his winner's purse of $300.
Grant (17), a Waitaki Boys' High School pupil who finished fourth in the race last year, lost some ground going down the slope when he almost tripped over a track marker.
Napper (18) made her first target when she reached the top of the hill first in the women's race.
"The hardest part for me was just after the top, when I had to get used to running down the slope," she said.
Napper finished strongly up the slope and was 1.46sec ahead of Ng, who was the surprise packet of the race.
