Advance Of Women Is Most Noticeable Feature Of Modern Athletics

Manawatu Times, Volume LV, Issue 6788, 20 February 1932, Page 13

Advance Of Women Is Most Noticeable Feature Of Modern Athletics

THEIR TRACK EVENTS NOW CALL FOR AS MUCH COACHING AND TRAINING AS ARE GIVEN TO MEN

HOTHING is more striking in modern athletics than the rise in the standard of women competitors and the increase in their number. Hurdle races for women will he on the programme of the Wellington A.A.A. championship meeting this season. The fact demonstrates how woman’s field of activity on the tracks is extending. , Not many years ago a woman’s running race was regarded as a joke. It was put on at picnics, like races for small children and old men. Post-war times provided opportunities for women to enter many sports that were regarded for years as peculiarly those of men, and athletics fell before the advance. ... Women tennis and hockey players, and women swimmers and golfers have been with us for years, but the woman runner is a more recent addition to the attractions of open-air sport. She won her way on to the athletic programme despite opposition, and women’s events are now an accepted part of almost every amateur sports meeting, and in many places are the most popular of all. Women train for their races just as men do, and study style and tactics just as thoroughly as most men. Rapid Rise. The remarkable fact about the introduction of running for women was that so many of them rose to the top flight so quickly. Nancye Eastwood, of Gisborne, was the best of the early women runners in this country, and she was followed by R. Manttan, of Wellington, a small but wiry girl with a great running style. While competing at a club meeting In Gisborne during his New Zealand tour, Jackson Seholz, _ the famous American and Olympic champion sprinter, watched the women’s race that was on the programme, for running events for women were still in the experimental stage then. After the race he pointed to the winner as she trotted back to pick up her coat where she had left it at the starting mark and declared, “Some day that kid will be great.” The girl was Norma Wilson, who later demonstrated the truth of that judgment. In Wellington later Norma Wilson ran 50yds in 0.6 2-5, which was the World’s record at the time, and covered 100yds in 0.11 2-5, which was also comparable with the best that was being done in other countries then.. Women athletes were running sprints and even high jumping, throwing the

a good girl runner could cover 100yds in 0.11 2-5 or 0.11 3-5. To he considered a lirst-class athlete a girl had to do better than that. The standard for women’s sprinting had improved greatly. In the next season, however, theic came into prominence Thelma Ivench, of Wellington, a niece of Harry Martis,

three times national sprint champion before the Great War.

Though only 16 years old she smashed Norma Wilson’s record of 0.13 2-5 lor 120yds in the 1929-30 season, and at Lower Hutt ran 100 metres in 0.12 2-5, one-fifth of a second outside the world’s record. At Wanganui she beat both Norma Wilson and Elaine Martyn for the New Zealand title, equalling the record with 0.11 1-5. She retained the title easily at Dunedin last summer. Thelma Kench is generally regarded as the best of our girl runners so far. She is a well-built and very strong girl, and produces a splendid finishing burst. If she could only make her dash out of the starting holes better she would probably be as near world’s class now as Norma Wilson was in 1928. High Standard Possible.

With proper coaching and steady training it is possible for a girl to reach a very high standard. This was proved on November 29, 1929, when Evelyn Hoyle, of Napier, who had been looked on as just a very good, club runner, scampered over 50yds in 0.6 1-10 at Waipukurau, time that was then better than the world’s record, and which is still a New Zealand record. Women’s records, however, have been going by the boards rapidly in the hist few years. Stella Walsh, PolishAmerican girl, reduced the 100yds world's record to 0.10 4-5 two seasons ago, and Ilelijn Filkcy, another American, brought the 50yds time down to 0.5 4-5.

The Wellington Centre of the . New Zealand Amateur Athletic Association, in introducing hurdle events for women, may be trying to find if Thelma Kench or any other aspirant, can develop enough skill to be worthy of sending to the Olympic Games this year. If that is the intention our girls will have to develop real class very quickly to justify hopes. Performances over hurdles have improved more than any. In 1929 Helen Filkey held the world’s record with 0.12 3-5 for 80yds low hurdles. In 1930 Marjorie Clark, of South Africa, and L. Sclirova, of Czechoslovakia, did 0.12 1-5. Last year “Babe” Didrikson put up 0.12, in the

idiscus, putting the shot, and hurdling in other countries by now, and almost every month some fresh record was being established. The universal appeal of the sport led to the introduction of women’s field and track events at the Olympic Games in 1928. Norma Wilson was selected to represent New Zealand, and was sent away with fairly confident hopes that she would do well in Amsterdam. Actually, possibly due to indisposition, she did not get further than the semi-finals in the 100 metres event, won by Betty Robinson, a remarkably versatile girl athlete from the United States, in 0.12 1-5.

In England, however, shq ran 120 yds in 0.13 2-5, a world’s record on a cinder track, and she won an invitation international dash at the famous Stamford Bridge ground. Definitely Established.

Quito apart from her running success, however, Norma Wilson’s appearance at the Olympic Games definitely established women’s running as an accepted part of athletic sport in the Dominion. , „ , , When she returned to New Zealand Miss Wilson ran 100yds in 0.11 3-5 and 120yds in 0.13 2-5 on January, 29, 1929, in Wellington, her time for the latter distance being a record.

By this time, however, there were so many girl runners and they were making such advances that 0.11 3-5 for 100 yds was as often done as 0.10 2-5 is by men. , , , _ , Elaine Martyn ('Christchurch), Evelyn Hoyle (Napier), Mavis Lean (Hastings), and Olive Jane (Napier) are girls whose names come to mind readily , when recalling those who ran 100yds in 0.11 3-a during 1928 and 1929. Elaine Martyn, in fact, won the New Zealand title from Norma Wilson in the 1928-29 season, and ran 100yds. in Christchurch in 0.11 1-5, establishing a new record for the distance. By that lime it had been shown that

United States and Betty Webb established the same time in the international meeting between England and Germany. Women’s events call for just as much training, coaching, and specialisation as men’s do now, and it is unlikely that New Zealand will be represented at the Los Angeles games, unless a new star is found, or some of the established performers make a very rapid advance.