Gill aims for success in Barcelona

New Zealand’s shot put sensation Jacko Gill will be all out to defend his world junior shot put title in Barcelona on Thursday morning.

Jacko Gill

Gill will be defending the under 20 title that he won two years ago in Moncton, Canada as a 15 year old, before he went on to win at the world youth (under 18) championships last year in Lille, France.

The Takapuna 17 year old is over a metre ahead of his ne arest rival. He leads the world junior rankings for 2012 with the 6kg shot with 22.30m. He had a best of 22.31m in 2011. His closet rival is Krzysztof Brzozowski of Poland who has a 2012 best of 21.14m. Brzozowski is the only person to have beaten Gill in age group competition, at the 2010 Youth Olympic Games in Singapore with the 5kg shot. Australian Damien Birkinhead is ranked third with 21.12m.

An added incentive for Gill is the world junior 6kg shot put record of 22.73m held by the current world senior champion David Storl of Germany since 2009.

The shot put qualifying rounds are timed for 7.10pm Wednesday evening (NZ time) and the final is at 5.20am Thursday morning (NZ time).

Gill is a member of a 13 strong New Zealand team competing at the championships which run from Tuesday to Sunday.

Julia Ratcliffe from Hamilton comes into the championships ranked eighth in the hammer throw with her recent performance of 64.21m.

Siositina Hakeai (Auckland), who threw the discus 54.49m in France at the end of last month is now ranked 13th, while Otago’s Rebekah Greene should perform well in the 3000m with her 15th ranked time of 9m 21.82s. Greene will also be competing in the 1500m.

Portia Bing (Auckland) has a best heptathlon total of 5276 but recent individual performances indicate she should improve on this.

Otago sprinter Andrew Whyte has shown good form with a big improvement in recent weeks to record a personal best 400m of 46.73s while Ben Moynihan, a late addition to the team is improving all the time in the 1500m.

The team and the days (Barecelona time) they will be competing are:

		Round 1	Semi-Final	Final
Rebekah Greene	3000m			10 July
Kodi Harman	100m	Heats 10 July	11 July	11 July
Andrew Whyte	400m	Heats 10 July	11 July	12 July
Ben Moynihan	1500m	Heats 10 July		12 July
Julian Oakley	1500m	Heats 10 July		12 July
Nicholas Southgate	Pole Vault	Qualifying 10 July		12 July
Jacko Gill	Shot Put	Qualifying 11 July		11 July
Phil Simms	400m hurdles	Heats 11 July	12 July	13 July
Julia Ratcliffe	Hammer	Qualifying 12 July		14 July
Portia Bing	Heptathlon			12 – 13 July
Kodi Harman	200m	Heats 12 July	12 July	13 July
Brad Mathas	800m	Heats 13 July	14 July	15 July
Julian Oakley	800m	Heats 13 July	14 July	15 July
Rebekah Greene	1500m	Heats 13 July		15 July
Siositina Hakeai	Discus	Qualifying 13 July		15 July
Merewarihi Vaka	Discus	Qualifying 13 July		15 July