Surrey Park will host two of the biggest athletics meetings on the southern calendar this summer, at opposite ends of the age range.
The South Island Masters Championship comes to Invercargill from 20 to 22 November, followed by the Colgate Games, New Zealand's premier junior track and field competition, from 15 to 17 January.
Masters athletics covers competitors from 30 upwards with no upper limit, grouped in five-year age brackets so that runners, jumpers, throwers and walkers compete against people of similar age.
The field will include Jim Blair, the 95-year-old Whanganui athlete and former Otago competitor who has said he will keep going for as long as he can.
Southland will be well represented. Evan MacIntosh is a perennial medal winner in the men's 80-plus grade, Debbie Telfer is the New Zealand women's 65-plus cross-country champion, and Claire Nichols competes across a range of running events in the 45-plus grade.
Ian Densie has entered six events in the men's 45-plus category, including the five-event pentathlon, while Linda Te Au, Craig Ivensen and coach Chris Knight are also on the start lists.
A thousand kids in January
The Colgate Games cater for athletes aged seven to 14. The most recent edition in Nelson attracted more than 1000 children, and organisers expect the Invercargill event to be at least as large.
The signs are good. The first children's competition of the season at Surrey Park drew more than 500 entries, and the games have a record of producing athletes who represent New Zealand within a year or two of competing.
The emphasis is on participation, though the older age groups bring plenty of hard-fought competition.
Rebuilding at the top
The two events arrive as Southland athletics works through a changing of the guard.
Five Southland athletes currently sit top of the national rankings in their age groups: Connor Gilliland in the under-20 110m hurdles and Ollie Davis in the under-20 long jump, both on American athletics scholarships; James Weber in the under-20 10,000m and mile; Millie McFadzien in the under-20 mile; and Lewis Blay in the under-18 10,000m and half marathon.
Weber, McFadzien and Blay are all heading away to university next year, and Kennedy Taylor, Hector O'Rouke, Siena Mackley and James McLeay are already at American colleges.
A younger group is stepping into the gap. Ashlee Clay (under-16 long and high jump), Charlotte Hawkes (under-16 steeplechase and 800m), Hunter Flowers (under-16 800m), Zoe Muir (javelin and discus) and Will Brown (high jump) have all medalled at national level, with Brodie Mcilwrick, CJ Iversen, Aidan Barkley, Lily Wiegersma and Freya Gilmore among the next wave.
For the masters in November and the children in January, Surrey Park will be the stage. For the club in between, the job is turning that depth into the next generation of Southland representatives.
