Sportsman’s Notebook VALERIE SLOPER'S GOOD DISCUS THROW

Press, Volume XCVII, Issue 28481, 10 January 1958, Page 3

Sportsman’s Notebook VALERIE SLOPER'S GOOD DISCUS THROW

Valerie Sloper must now be considered to have a distinct chance of winning two events at the Empire Games at Cardiff later in the year. A report from Gisborne earlier this week said that Miss Sloper had thrown the discus 158 ft Bin. This distance is more than 7ft further than Yvette Williams’s national record made in 1954 and is one that would have ranked seventh in the world in 1955

A new event on the Empire Games programme at Vancouver, the discus was won then by Miss Williams with a throw of 147 ft Bin, Although standards have improved somewhat since, Miss Sloper’s prospects for a win in this event as well as in the shot look particularly bright for she has ample time to improve before the Games. There seems a distinct pos-

sibility of Miss Sloper challenging Russian supremacy for the discus throw as she has done with the shot and with more than

two years to the Rome Olympics, she may well, by that time, be the leading competitor in both events. Althougn still a little more than 28ft behind the world record. Miss Sloper’s future advance with the discus is likely to be just as great as her progress in the shot. Already this season she has added mop than 14 feet to her distance. Now having mastered the shot she will be able to spare a little more time for developing her ability with the discus and she may ultimately reach the stage where she finds that she is better in this event than the shot. 1

« # # Jack Kramer The American professional lawn tennis player. Jack Kramer, who will appear at Wilding Park with fellow professionals on Thursday, was the world professional champion from 1948 to 1953. In 1947. Kramer won the Wimbledon title, then turned professional. In his first professional tour, Kramer defeated Bobby Riggs by 23 matches to 21. He then successively beat Richard Gonzales (96-27), Panchoo Segura (64-28) and Frank Sedgman (54-41) in 1949, 1951 and 1953. % ¥ ¥ ¥ Dutch Swimmers Cornelia Gastalaars, aged 19, and Cornelia Schimmell, aged 18, the two leading Dutch women swimmers, have shown an unusual style of training in Australia recently. The main object of their method of training is to give power to the leg drive. The girls use the butterfly stroke and then turned on the back and, with the arms outstretched and the hands overlapped kicked lengths of the pool, i They also kicked several lengths with training boards.

Quick Scoring

Beating the Nelson team outright during a five-match northern tour, the New Zealand University Wanderers team scored 172 runs in 59 minutes in its second innings A sporting declaration by the Nelson captain, I. H. Ching, left one hour for University to score 168. The opening batsmen, G. A. Leggat and J. C Thompson, put on the first 100 in 38 minutes, with Leggat scoring 72 and Thompson 66. The runs were scored for the loss of five wickets, and several Nelson bowlers were harshly treated. P. Bloomfield bowled two overs for 25 runs, I. B. Leggat four overs for 30 runs. R. .S. Chailies six overs for 36 runs and D. Currie four overs for 34 runs In the University first innings Bloomfield had bowled the first four batsmen before they scored, but M. H. Buckenham scored a century later in the innings. ¥ ¥ ¥ Zambucka Memorial In memory of the late New Zealand motor racing driver, Fred Zambucka. the long, downhill, 170 miles an hour straight at the Orange motor racing circuit in Australia may be named after him for the South Pacific Championships on January 27. Although Zambucka created his 1954 lap average of more than 100 miles an hour in his old Maserati, the record still stands—in spite of subi sequent attempts by later model , Maseratis and Ferraris. ZamI bucka and another New Zea- , lander. John McMillan, who res cently settled in Sydney, were two -I of the leading drivers at the Orange circuit in 1954 and gave isome brilliant performances.

Veteran Athlete

A Polish Olympic represents, five in 1932 and 1936. Stella Walsh recorded the best American score

for the women’s pentathlon at California on October 20. Her score of 3809 points for the five events beat the 15-day-old record made by Ann Ronniger by six points. Stella Walsh’s individual per-

formances were: shot put 32ft BJin, high jump 4ft 2iin, 200 metres 25.35ec, 80 metres hurdles 13.2 sec, long jump 18ft sJin. ¥ ¥ ¥

Canterbury Bowlers Three Canterbury batsmen, M. E. Chapple, R. C. Motz and S. C. Guillen, appear in the first six places in the Plunket Shield batting averages to date, but only A R. Mac Gibbon of the province s bowlers occupies such a high position. J. W. Kiddey and M. B. Poore, two all-rounders, have bowled the most overs for Canterbury in its three shield matches this season. Poore has bowled 120 overs, and has taken 11 wickets for 192 runs. Kiddey has taken four wickets for 160. runs, but has been comparatively ’nexpensive in his 108 overs. M E. Chapple has conceded 115 runs from 88 overs. Motz and MacGibbon have also given less than two runs an over.