ATHLETICS

Otago Daily Times, Issue 22164, 18 January 1934, Page 4

ATHLETICS

By Amatedb.

COMING EVENTS January 20.—Southland Sub-centre championships at Invercargill. .January 27. —Otago Centre’s- evening meeting at -Caledonian Ground. February 3. —Otago championships, at Caledonian Ground. February iff.—Meeting at Milton., February 16 and 17.—New Zealand championships at Wellington. February 24.—-Australian athletes’ appearance at Dunedin. March,3,— lntel-provincial meeting, Otago v. Canterbury’. . . 1 March 17.—University interfacility championships; St. Patrick’s Club, sports. LAST SATURDAY’S MEETING The success that attended the evening meeting held at 'the Caledonian Ground I last Saturday shows that, scratch . racing in this form , is-much more acceptable, both, to the public, and ..the competitors, than the complicated way, in which it was first introduced. The, various events .were watched with keen interest, and the . close, finishes that were fought put in several eases had the spectators on their toes. The A Grade 220, Yards went to E. Fish, who is now again resident in Dunedin, and he had a. fairly easy victory from W.- A. ;Pullar, who had- beaten him in, the; heat. PuUar is going particularly, .well just now, and- again went well to' beat Price,-, in the 220 at the Anglican Club’s 220 Championship on. Monday night.. '.' •>.. ,■ . The A Grade 880. Yards provided a fairly comfortable win for 1.. Craig, the Hanover Baptist star. , J. Watt led the . field for the greater . part of the race, and : then Craig took the - lead, with Barries, .the New Zealand mile champion, some distance away.,. The latter caught Craig, bn«the bench but the- Hanover Baptist man shook him off, and reached the tape first by a fair,.margin. The race was run Tn the slow time of 2min 7sec. The-Three . Miles resulted ;in a win for . J. J.. Morris, who has had- three, firsts out of four , starts this season. Morris, who has shown gratifying signs of returning form-.during the past two or three months, was never really troubled, and won by oyer 100 yards' from Barnes. The latter, however, was not in the best of form, having previously, rpn,in the .Half Mile, and.it is expected that he: will put up a better showing at Invercargill on Saturday.. r BROAD ; BAY ROADRACE . Althoughthere’was such a poor, entry in the' 20-Mile Road Race held from'the Caledonian Ground to Broad Bay and back, last Saturday, it no doubt, provided a valuable Workout for" E. C;v Brown, -who will be competing at the triarathori race to be held afWellirigtori during the second day ■of the New Zealand Hack and held championships on February . 17.; That Brown,' who won the: race, may be expected to', 1 ' perforin 1 well, ’ when - he ‘ goes north was shown "by the fact" that he finished fresh on Saturday, arid even if, gavidan is ariiorig his' opponents this Should not trouble-the; Civil Service man unduly, as he is’a very consistent runner. Pope;; who finished*, secqnd bri; Saturday, showed: what’;'may be accomplished by, Sheer determination and adherence to training, ans' A, Frye, the only other starter).'deserves a great deal of credit for sticking to it when" be had to run from start itb 'finish brhimself. ■ /.; ~T 1 , ; • " southland championships A■' fair 1 number of' Dunedin' ‘ athletes has 'decided to make the 1 trip to Invercargill on .Saturday) . arid,; the Southland champibbship' meeting' sKorrld be. rendered the more-'‘attractive_' by 'their • ■presence. Among -those 'who:' Will; be tpavelhqg, are R) O.' Jbhnsbri, ! whq" Will pompete' in. the fielff; events ;);Ei "Fish,"’for! the sprints . and. 'probably'thb ( 'T4o;, J., G/.Barri'es, one apd 'tirree ,n(ile6;J.' J.’ Morns, brie and three miles;' 1 K.' DohoVan, half-hrilc; R. Colston, ■ who has a good chance- in the junior- half-mile; . L. Geary and I. George. ; Judging by reports from the 'south, -some "good l competition •should eyentuatd, and it is not improbable that -records ■ will ’be broken.' Those iii.:tending" to make' the > trip from Dunedin are requested tb 'communicate with 'J. J. Morris immediately. ’ CI^Ub"CHAMPIONSHIPS \ Two’ interesting " eventsat the' Caver- ; sham Club’s championships;’ on' 1 r Tuesday ri iglit Were the ■ 100 Yards ’arid' the, ’Half Mile." In . the fpririei-’W/ Smith/ 1 the;' ex l . ■ Leith irrinner. ; who .is : a ‘,.vqry consistent sprinter,' went'wbll to/bfeat, K./ffliller'/ih fair time. ’ The ' Half; 'Mile , Went; to ''.'K> Donbvari; Who .ia jmproVipg al} .the tiriie, He went ’a very, good race ( to beat J.d. '’MorrlsTri a little ovgr.2ipln 7sec against 'a'Tairiy.'strbrig-'hreeze. Xl’l ? "’ 1 At' thri “Civil Service meeting; the .same night A. B. Thomson was the outstanding sprinter, and showed by the way he won the 220 Yards that he is in a class of his Own in the club Where the sprints .are concerned. , In the Mile,,:which drew a small field) A. R. Geddes managed )to hang op to ,L, C. M'Lachlan arid J. G. Barnes until the straight Was reached. Barnes led entering the straight) but in a good fi.nish M'Lachjan came away well 1 to Win by about ,fiye yards .in 4min iOsee l —very fair time under, the .conditions.. , The Quarter Mile Hurdles wept to J. Gerlpen; with Barnes second and M'Lachlan Third. - AN IMPASSE “ . 1 Should the tour of the three Australian athletes eventuate? —and from all appearances it is likely to do so—the Otago Centre will probably be forced into doing something it does not wish •to do. At the last meeting of the centre a letter was received, from-the Otago Caledonian Society requesting support in the shape of amateur events'for, the society’s meeting, to be held at the Caledonian Ground on February 24; •; With .'only one exception the members of the centre were not in favour of holding a mipced. programme of amateur arid professional events, but the fact that the Australians will be .in Dunedin on the, date of the Caledonian Society’s meeting has, no doubt, created a decidedly' unpleasant situation. ...If the centre maintains its decision to withhold its support from the professional; meeting it may find itself without a ground oh which to display the Australian visitors. Carisbrook and Logan; Park will doubtless be occupied by cricketers, and it seems that the only available ground will be Tahuna Park,; the situation of which is Certainly not conducive to large attendances, nor the surface to good performances, In addition, the. professional meeting is certain to take a portion of the crowd that would attend the amateur meeting. What, then, is to be done? - . . v NOTES; •, F. H, Stephenson won the 100 Yards A Grade scratch eilent at a recent_ meeting at Wellington, and appears to be in pretty good form. It was his race all the way, and he was not full out. With a little more tuning up the Olympic Games representative, Don Evans, of Taihape, is expected to be in first-class form. He won the points prize at the athletic meeting held in Taihape on New j Year’s Day. Athletes will regret to hear of the accident in which Stuart Black; the New Zealand quarter-mile champion and Olympic representative, was badly injured. It is extremely unlikely (saysa northern paper). that he will be. fit for the national championships in , February, and his ’ absence from the 440 Yards field will rob that event of a lot of its attraction. As has happened in Otago, Saturday scratch meetings have also proved a failure, in Auckland and Wellington, although’ they continue to be successful in Christchurch. The right method seems to have been adopted here now in bolding meetings with programmes such as that on Saturday night, and a similar arrangement .is being tried out in Wellington. It is likely that before long Auckland will introduce its scratch racing along these lines. The Melbourne Sporting Globe reports that negotiations have been opened up by. the Victorian Athletic League for Eddie Tolan, the American negro and Olympic sprint, champion, who is now a professional, to make a toumof Australia and compete iii special carnivals in Victoria/ in connection with the Victorian centenary. The matter has been referred, to a sub-committee, which will consider the proposal: of-issuing debentures with a view to financing the trip. • " : , Three of Finland’s.most famous Olympic, athletes, and Ossian Roschier, an athletic promoter, are reported to have been suspended on October 21 by the'Finnish Amateur Athletic Association for periods ranging from six months to. life.’ Those suspended were:— Lauri Lehtineri/ Olympic 5000 metres champion, until June' 1. 1934, for refusal to participatein a Finriish-, English meet; Ossiaa ■ Boschiej:*-ft pro-;

nioter, for two years,, for allegedly offering a split in the profits of a meet to Paavo Nur.ini, and Edwin Wide; Emo lurje. ( Olympic runner, for life, for competing as -a professional against Jules Ladouipegue, of France; Antero Kivi, second in diepus, 1920 Olympics, .for for “conduct unworthy of a sportsman.” ,