ZooM Athletics Group in Gunnedah is producing regional and NSW Country medallists with athletes returning good results from recent competitions.
Coaches Andrew Frend and Adrienne Rankin have joined forces to encourage and assist athletes to achieve their goals and the results are showing with pleasing performances at the NSW Country titles in Maitland last month.
Luke Jeffrey, competing in the under 15 age group, won gold in the shot put with a throw of 10.62m and came third in the 100 metres in 13.02 seconds.
The emerging young star went on to make his debut at the NSW Junior Championships last weekend, stopping the clock at 12.53 seconds in the Under 15 100m heat and lowering this to 12.44 seconds in the final qualifying him as the ninth fastest in the state.
Luke ran the 200m heat in a personal best time of 25.39s, which was not quite good enough to qualify for the final – overall he finished tenth out of the 22 runners.
Luke’s coach split-timed the run and his first 100m was 12.09 seconds and the second 100m was 13.3 seconds which his coach said was an amazing first leg.
Luke also competed in the discus and finished tenth with a distance of 30.08m. In the shot put he was not up to his best coming short of his best throw but still placed a creditable tenth place with a distance of 10.3m His triple jump was similar again coming under his personal best with a jump of 9.96m placing him in sixth place.
Josh Jeffrey was on fire at the NSW Country championships grabbing two gold medals – first place in the 100-metre event (17.12 seconds) and the long jump where he stretched himself to 3.46 metres to claim the gold.
A jump of 5.26 metres handed Harry Ryman a silver medal in the long jump with a finalist ribbon in the 100 metres where he finished sixth in 14.09 seconds.
Kaisha Edwards won a silver medal in the triple jump (9.94m) and came third in her heat and eighth overall in the 400m, stopping the clock at 1:09.69, while Eryn Benham finished 15th in the 100m event in a very fast age group.
On day two of the Country Championship, Josh Jeffrey added gold in the shot put (5.90m) to his two medals from the previous day, with Luke Jeffrey winning two silver medals – triple jump (10.73m) and high jump (1.45m)
Harry Ryman picked up a bronze in the triple jump over 10.42m, with Kaisha Edwards finishing in the top 10 in the 200m in a time of 29.47 seconds.
The total medal haul for the carnival was 10 gold, 14 silver, 12 bronze and a pleasing 10 personal best times registered.
A team of 13 athletes also competed with great success at the regional championships in Tamworth across 45 events.
Luke and Josh Jeffrey, Ruby, Hannah and Jake Cygan, Katie and Josh Spinks, Harry and Archie Ryman, Eryn Benham, Cooper and Ashley Ross, Bailey Skepper, Lacie and Zaden Kleinschafer and
Charlee Adamson turned in promising performances over the two days. The unplaced athletes still performed well with credible results.
Day two yielded more medals and outstanding performances, with a total of eight gold, seven silver, and five bronze.
ZooM Athletics coaches have combined aqua jogging and pool training with track skills at Donnelly Fields to enhance the performances of their charges.
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