2011/12 Track & Field Season

Location of Canterbury Athletics for 2011-12

As you will be aware, Canterbury Athletics was severely affected by the earthquakes in September and February, to the extent that QEII can no longer be used as the base for track and field athletics in Christchurch.

A committee, garnered from the various groups involved in athletics, has been working hard on finding a new site for a track and getting this ready for the upcoming season.  Without going into all the details, they recommended a number of possible sites to the council and have recently gained approval (and some financial assistance) to upgrade the facilities at Rawhiti Domain.

There are a number of benefits to having it here, the main one being it will be a sole use facility so it can be looked after year round and not have other sports damage it over winter.

The track will be a grass track, and all jump areas and throw circles will have all-weather surfaces.

For those of you old enough (or rural enough!) to remember, grass tracks are great and are a little easier on the legs.   Some issues arise if it rains but I think the facility will be of a high standard if not quite to the same level we had been lucky enough to become used to.

Work is also underway to get a new all-weather track established in the city but this may be a number of years away, so New Brighton could be the home of Canterbury Athletics for the next 2 or 3 years.

Canterbury Children’s Athletics

The Saturday morning programme for children’s athletics will continue in the same format as previous years. This will run from 9.00am – 12.30pm and will be based at Rawhiti Domain.  About every 4^th week, the programme will run in Timaru and will have a later start time.  The Canterbury Children’s Champs (March 2012), will also be held in Timaru on their all-weather track.  A full timetable will be published on the Canterbury Athletics website as soon as it is finalised.

The starting date for competition is 15October 2011.  Because Rawhiti Domain will not quite be ready, the first two weekends of competition will be at Burnside High School.

Sumner Running Club Athletics

This will operate from Ferrymead Park along similar lines to last year.  The grounds here are relatively unaffected and we should have no major issues getting underway toward the end of September or early October.  Details of registration and open day will appear on the website shortly.

If you would like to be of assistance in helping us continue the athletics programme for the juniors, please contact Lockie Campbell julio@es.co.nz