McCartney reaches World Championship standard

Eliza McCartney
Photo: PHOTOSPORT

Rio 2016 Olympic pole vault bronze medalist Eliza McCartney has achieved her summer aim of gaining at World Championship qualifying standard.

McCartney posted a season best and World Championship entry standard of 4.71m to win at the Brisbane Track Classic.

After facing her injury challenges in recent years, the 2016 Olympic bronze medallist has suggested throughout a confidence boosting season – which included a first New Zealand title for six years – a return to her vintage best.

At the Continental Tour Silver meet the 26-year-old Aucklander emphatically underlined the point by bettering her season’s best by 10cm to achieve the entry standard for the Budapest World Championships.

McCartney flirted with danger at her opening height of 4.45m, requiring a third time clearance to stay involved in the competition.

However, after the early scare she found her rhythm at her next height of 4.65m, soaring clear at the first time of asking before the bar was raised to that critical 4.71m height. After missing out with her opening attempt she pinged over with her second effort to secure her best height since January 2019.

Olivia McTaggart – who has already clinched the 4.71m World Championship entry standard – had to settle for second with a best of 4.45m. New Zealand completed a clean sweep of the podium with Imogen Ayris taking third in 4.25m.

McCartney said: “I’m elated and relieved and I’m quite exhausted too, I put a lot into that today.

“I’m finding my feet quite a bit and this season and it is all about lots of practise jumping. At my opening height (of 4.45m) I must have had four or five attempts at that height because I kept pulling out with dodgy winds and walking back on the runway, which it not how you want to do it.

“This week in training I’ve started doing a 14-step run up, which is my favourite – that was my step up when winning bronze in Rio and for my PB (of 4.94m in 2018).

“I think that extra speed (from the 14-step run-up) meant I didn’t have to work so hard (at clearing 4.71m), even though I’m on similar poles, and I can just go for it.”

Zoe Hobbs extended her unbeaten record for the year by claiming a convincing victory in the women’s 100m, recording a time of 11.20 (-0.1).

Eddie Osei-Nketia signed off his athletics career in style to inflict defeat on his Australian rival Rohan Browning and claim an emphatic victory in the men’s 100m, recording a slick season’s best mark of 10.13 (-1.0m/s).

Osei-Nketia, the New Zealand 100m record-holder who is leaving the sport to take up American Football at the University of Hawai’i, produced a blistering start and quickly established control of the race.

Osei-Nketia said post-race: “It’s emotional now that I’m leaving the sport. It is heart-breaking. All the memories I’ve made and all the competitors I’ve competed against. It is sad, but all good things come to an end.”

Canterbury’s Tiaan Whelpton was third with of a time of 10.34s.

James Preston maintained his 100 per cent record over the two-lap distance in 2023 to claim another Kiwi victory at the Queensland Sport and Athletics Centre to produce an assured men’s 800m victory in 1:47.00.

Sitting midfield at the bell, Preston, the New Zealand all-time 800m number three, made a decisive move down the back straight on the final lap accelerating quickly to the front before repelling the challenge of Australia’s Jack Lunn to clinch top spot by 0.15. Lunn’s countryman Jamie Harrison picked up third in 1:47.39 with Kiwi Brad Mathas, the national 800m silver medallist, crossing the line fourth in 1:47.58.

Rosie Elliott dug deep to preserve her unbeaten women’s 400m record in 2023 to overhaul Ellie Beer in the latter stages and grab an absorbing victory in 52.88.

Double Paralympic long jump champion Anna Grimaldi showed impressive sprint form to record 12.61 (+0.9) – and come within 0.01 of her national T47 100m record in the women’s para 100m.

New Zealand double Paralympic sprint medallist Danielle Aitchison T36 also produced a good run to cross the line sixth in 14.19.