On Track and Field

Sun (Auckland), Volume I, Issue 149, 14 September 1927, Page 12

On Track and Field

Amateur Athletic Notes

By

“SPARTAN”

The following is the season’s programme of the Auckland Centre of the New Zealand Amateur Athletic Association:— Next Saturday. —Auckland 50 miles amateur cycling; road race championship and three-mile steeplechase at Alexandra Park. October 1. Auckland Club’s joint meeting with [Franklin A.A. and C. Club at PukekoheOctober 22. Auckland Club holds special afternoon’s programme. October 24. Akarana Club holds Labour Day sports at the Domain. October 29. —Auckland Club, carnival afternoon. November s.—Auckland Club, carnival afternoon. CHAMPIONSHIPS November 12. —Auckland provincial amateur athletic championships at the Domain. December 9 and 10. —New Zealand amateur athletic championships at Christchurch. December 26, 27, 28, and 29. —New Zealand and Australian amateur athletic championships at Wellington. • * • Saturday’s Programme Next Saturday, the Auckland Centre of the New Zealand Amateur Athletic Association will conduct the Auckland provincial amateur 50 miles cycling road race championship. The event will be run out to Clevedon and back, finishing on the trotting track at Alexandra Park. The following is the supporting programme:—Three miles cross-country championship and sealed handicap, 75yds handicap. 120yds hurdles handicap. 440yds handicap, 75yds ladies’ handicap, high jump handicap, half-mile junior cycle handicap, two miles junior cycle handicap, field and novelty events. Shirley’s Long L.ist When Jack Shirley strolled up to the platform at the banquet tendered to the visiting cyclists by the Auckland A.A.A. on Saturday evening to be presented with the medals he had won at the last Auckland provincial championship meeting someone shouted “Can you carry them all?” Besides

being Auckland 120yds hurdles champion hop, step and jump champion, throwing the discus champion and high jump champion, Shirley came second in the broad jump championship. He is one of those all-rounders, super-men who annex titles without very much effort and without bothering much about expensive training. Famous Athletic Club That famous body of British athletes —the Achilles Club —went on a tour of Germany recently for the first time that an English team has gone to the land of the Huns since the war. So far the Englishmen have competed in two tournaments and won both, and defeated the pick of Germany’s athletes in a triangular contest with the wellknown Deutsche and Berliner Sports Klubs. They were successful in all but the sprint and field events. Such a record supports the contention that Britian will be more formidable than she has been for many years at Amsterdam next Summer. • * * Cooper’s Fine Win Norman Cooper, after a winter of fine displays, capped all by winning the Auckland provincial cross-country

championship at Alexandra Park last Saturday. Cooper has to his credit onwin, five seconds, one third and two fifths in steeplechase events this win ter. He went South with the Auckland team which competed at the New Zealand cross-country championships in Christchurch last August, and finished ninth after competing against such runners as J. W. Savidan, G. Gibbons and J. Tapp over the stiffest course of its kind ever set for a steeplechase in the Dominion. * * * Brilliant N.S.W. Runner Botany’s brilliant distance: runner, H. (“Micky”) Hayden, has had a lengtlw career as an athlete. One of the State’s foremost road athletes he has been running well this season. Since 1912 he has scored the N.S.W. five-mile cross-country title thrice, 10 miles five times and Manly Modified Marathon, 10 miles, on five occasions. Twice in succession he finished first in the Victorian Marathon, of 26 miles 385 yards. It is generally admitted that he is the best road runner ever possessed in N.S.W. m * * The Junior Champion Jack Green, who won the Auckland two-mile cross-country championship on Saturday, is a Mount Albert Grammar School boy who has turned out on Saturdays for the past month or so to get into training for the annual school race. Up till Saturday, however, he has never revealed his true form, being alwa \ content to finish in the first half I zen. Should he continue as he has begun, he ought to be one of Auckland's mainstays over long distances in the future. * * * Three Auckland Stalwarts Just what a lot Auckland owes to the ability of one or two of her champion athletes would have been realised if the names of J. W Savidan, A. J Elliott and J. W. Shirley had not appeared on the list at the medal presentation evening last Saturday. Between them they have annexed nine titles: . .J. W. Savidan, winner of Neva Zealand 10,000 metres cross-country championship, Auckland mile, and three-mile champion. A. J. Elliott, 100 yards and 220 yards Auckland champion. J. W. Shirley, hop, step and jump champion, 120 yards hurdles champion, throwing the discus champion, high jump champion. They Made Them Run Three good performers who made the winners run in Saturday’s steeplechases were E. P. Henshall, G. Gilchrist, and F. Adams. In the senior race Henshall led for a time, but later he fell back and fought out second place with Gilchrist. Adams kept up to Green for a time in the junior championship, but the pace was too hot and he finished 200 yards behind him. The entries in Saturday’s events were not very large, and at the last minute some of them pulled out on account of the wretched weather. * • • Here and There Horace Roper, well-known Auckland sprinter, got a pleasant surprise on evening when he learned that a prominent old athlete had decided to make him a present of five guineas to reward his remarkable record in the 75 yards handicap sprint events this winter. Roper has started in every race, and only once has he been unplaced. By running 60 miles at Buluwayo in 7 hours 33 minutes 55 seconds, Arthur Newton, the champion long-distance runner, broke the world’s record for the distance by 49 minutes 5 seconds. He now holds all of the world’s longdistance records from 10 miles to 100 miles.

TRAINING HINTS

This is the fourth of a series of articles specially written for THE SUN by Mr. C. H. Taylor, of Christchurch, former Australasian middle distance champion. Recognised as one of the great stylists of his day, Mr. Taylor's views should prove not only interesting, but instructive to athletes, especially the younger brigade. ARM ACTION A fault in form that is most easily seen and corrected is in the arm-action of a runner, although the point must not be forgotten that every movement in running should co-ordinate with every other movement. Although personally I ran with the straight

ahead or American method, the English style is to be recommended. It is the simpler and is adopted by such well-known runners as H. M. Abrahams, A. E. Porritt and D. G. A. Lowe. The arms should be swung rather across the body, the hands being on about a. level with the hips, and the elbows kept fairly close, into the sides. Something like the motion aimed at is obtained by taking a stick 18 inches long and holding one end in each hand when running. Though the style will seem cramped when the stick is used, this trouble will vanish when the hands are free. This style prevents the hands from coming up too high in front, and from “fighting the air,” a common fault that is particularly noticeable at the finish of a quartermile. A runner must keep his form right to the finish of a race. There is a tendency, much too common, to lose form on entering the straight. Often a runner will go to pieces over the last few yards when he is trying to cram on the pace. And diving or jumping at the tape is a complete loss of form. WHAT ENGLAND NEEDS TO WIN THE GAMES Why has Britain failed to retain top place among the nations at the Olympic Games? That is the question A. B. George, British Olympic coach in 1924 and winner of a dozen amateur championships in England, Canada, and the United States, attempted to answer recently in an article in the London “Sporting Life.” An extract from his article is appended. ‘That Britain lacks good athletic materia] is not the opinion of experts who have given the subject close study. “The wonderful hurdlers we have a.t the present time is one convincing proof of this, while the performances of high-grade athletes like Eric Liddell, Harold Abrahams, Douglas Lowe, H. M. Stallard, Guy Butler, Cecil Elliss, Cecil Griffiths, Fred Gaby, Lord Burghley, and S. Ferris, to mention a few, show that ‘the cradle of athletics’ is still able to produce men equal to the highest demand. “To those who appreciate the situation it is nothing less than wonderful that Britain’s athletes have done as well as they have at the Olympic Games. There is no occasion to feel despondent, and if proper steps are taken we shall do much better in the future. “If a million pounds were available and the best steps taken, we might possibly gain first place at the games ten years hence. Let all concerned ponder over this. “We have the material, but it is not sufficiently cultivated, as shown by our performances in the field events when up against experts from other countries. “We win a small measure of success in track athletics through the superexcellence of a few brilliant performers, some of whom would have taken even higher honours had they been properly instructed when at school. “We have some splendid material for the Amsterdam Olympic Games, and if full use is made of this, vve ought to do better than at any festival since 1908. “It is necessary to look further ahead, however, and the need of the hour is some practical steps to teach the lads and girls of the nation the elementary rules of track and field athletics “If that million pounds were forthcoming. the situation would be made easier, but even without the expenditure of a vast sum of money it is possible to put a very useful scheme into operation.”