Larissa Dykes continued her remarkable comeback by winning two medals - gold in the 100m and bronze in the 200m - at the Oceania championships in Cairns recently.
Dykes (26) returned to her job as marketing and communications manager at the Fortune Theatre this week with her appetite for top athletics enhanced.
She was a promising sprinter when she was growing up in Alexandra and competed in the New Zealand secondary schools championships as a teenager.
But she gave up serious athletics for six years when she was a marketing student at the University of Otago.
Her interest in the sport was revived when she became a coach at an international sports training camp in the United States for six months.
"I realised how much I missed the sport," she said.
"I wanted to see how much I could achieve."
This is her second year back into serious athletics in Brent Ward's sprint stable, and she has achieved some remarkable results over the past six months.
In February, she ran a personal best 100m in 12.06sec in Hamilton and this got her selected in the New Zealand development relay squad to prepare for the 2014 Commonwealth Games in Glasgow.
She was in the New Zealand relay team that competed against 13 countries at a series of meetings in Japan in May and was selected for the Oceania championships.
Dykes proved her temperament in Cairns when she won the gold medal in the 100m in 12.32sec and bronze in the 200m in a personal best 25.85sec.
Dykes' next targets are the Commonwealth Games and the Olympic Games in Rio de Janeiro in 2016.
Physical education student Rozie Robinson, a double New Zealand champion in Auckland in March, won the open women's 5000m walk in Cairns in a personal best time of 24min 34.24sec.
She was also fourth in the 10km walk in 49min 43sec. It was a personal best time by 15sec.
New Zealand champion Marshall Hall won a silver medal in the men's discus with a throw of 50.43m.
His training partner, Jerram Huston, had his best throw for 12 months when he won a silver medal for 14.89m in the shot put.
Waitaki Boys' High School sprinter Blair Grant won a silver medal in the under-20 100m on the first day of the Oceania championships. Grant's time was 11.11sec.
Dunedin student Christina Grant (Southland) won gold medals in the women's 1500m (4min 40.21sec) and 3km steeplechase (11min 21.94sec).
Oceania championships
Otago medallists
Gold: Larissa Dykes (100m), Rozie Robinson (5000m walk).
Silver: Marshall Hall (discus), Jerram Huston (shot put), Blair Grant (100m).
Bronze: Dykes (200m).
