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Jacko Gill - Source: Photosport -
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Olympic Games prospect Jacko Gill has confirmed he will compete in the shot-put alongside triple women's world champion Valerie Adams in tomorrow's International Track Meet in Christchurch.
The 17-year-old junior world shot put champion made the announcement after arriving from Auckland yesterday to prepare for the event at Christ's College.
"I'm going to throw the shot put and the discus on Saturday; I'm looking forward to it.
"I'm not in the best condition I've been in. I haven't really freshened up, but I'll just throw and see what happens. It's for a good cause, so I'll just do the best I can."
Gill said the opportunity to compete in the allcomers shot put event "against Valerie, one of New Zealand's all-time greats", was too enticing to turn down. "It's really great to compete against her in a competition."
Adams and Gill used to train occasionally together when both were coached by Didier Poppe in Auckland. But Gill said they had not seen much of each other since Adams moved to Switzerland to train with Jean-Pierre Agger.
The pair had a reunion at a car-rental counter yesterday at Christchurch Airport, where Adams introduced Gill to Agger, who guided Adams to her third world championship title last year.
Gill is very much a shot put specialist and rarely throws the discus, yet he is still good enough to be ranked fifth in the world in the under-18 age-group at the discus.
Gill - track and field's youngest-ever junior world champion as a 15-year-old in 2010, supplanting Beijing Olympic sprint gold medallist Usain Bolt - said he only trained for the discus "once or twice a year", and had done "probably one or two sessions" leading up to the Christchurch meet.
"But it's quite similar to the shot put, technique-wise, so I'll see how I do."
Gill - whose father, Walter, was a former national shot put and discus champion - has thrown 20.38m with the 7.26kg senior shot to break a 44-year New Zealand record - and believes he can improve considerably before the London Olympic Games in August.
"Training's been going really well. I've been mixing it up with some 8k and some 7k [runs] and just working on the weights side of things. I'm obviously not as strong [as the older competitors]," he said.
"I don't push it too much, but I've decided to work on that."
"I'm throwing really well and I think I can improve a lot. I've done some training bests and it's working really well. By the time the Olympics are ready, hopefully I can do really well there."
Adams, meanwhile, won her third straight world title last year, with a championship record and personal best throw of 21.24m at Daegu in South Korea in August. She was unbeaten in all competitions in 2011.
Gill qualifies for the Olympics by a mere 12 days - International Federation of Athletics Associations [IAAF] rules state Olympic shot putters must turn 18 in Olympic year and Gill's 18th birthday falls on December 20.
He will be competing against men almost twice his age, so strength is an issue. Beijing Olympics silver medallist Christian Cantwell regularly bench presses 300 kilos.
"That's what I have to compete against," said Gill, who has done 195kg.
But his numbers are rising.
"I got a PB [personal best] last night of eight [repetitions] of 161, which is probably worth about a 200 to 210.
"I'm not freshening up at the moment, I'm doing more heavy work, with eight reps. So when I go back to my singles, hopefully I'll get those big PBs again."
