Athletics: Classic to reflect on godfather

Officials Barry Jones (left), Bruce Smith, (runner), Neville Smith, Sharee Jones, Anne Jones and Richard Potts are among the army of volunteers at the Potts Classic on Saturday. Photo / Duncan Brown

He was resplendent as an athletics coach in Hawke's Bay, but when not mentoring youngsters he found a perch in his golf chair around myriad meetings in search of the next budding talent.

This Saturday Allan Potts will be conspicuous by his absence at the Bay's biggest meeting, named after his wife, the late Sylvia Potts.

Actually the annual competition has been aptly renamed the Allan and Sylvia Potts Memorial Classic to be staged at the Hawke's Bay Regional Sports Park in Hastings.

Without doubt the absence of the indomitable figure will be felt most at the classic, the 16th one in the province, but future generations will hear of his accomplishment, thanks to a community drive to add impetus to the event.

"We've got like heaps of local sponsors who have come in to help out," says son and organiser Richard Potts, saluting Sileni Wines owner Sir Graeme Avery for spearheading the sponsorship with Andrew Spence Pharmacy, Hawke's Bay Orthodontics and Sylvia Potts' brother, John Oxenham.

A cluster of former athletes around the country whose lives Allan touched with his coaching is also in the mix.

"This year again we have different sponsors for every different event, plus new sponsors," Potts says.

Dubbed the godfather of Hawke's Bay/Poverty Bay athletics, Allan Potts lost his battle with bone cancer in May last year, a year before his 80th birthday.

Among the stable of elite athletes Allan Potts coached are Rex Wilson, Michelle Green, Briar Toop, Phil Costley, Howard Healey, Hamish Christensen, Matthew Holder, Neville Smith, Andrew Peskett, Gareth Hyett, Andrea Williams, Michael O'Connor, Peter Maulder, Kirsty Turnbull, Neil Sargisson, Yvonne Timmer, Heather Marsters, sons Richard and Nicholas Potts, Richard Tayler, Nola Bond and hurdler Helen Pirovano.

The life member of New Zealand Athletics and Hastings Harriers Club also coached wife Sylvia (nee Oxenham) to the Olympic level.

She competed at the 1968 Mexico Games and to two Commonwealth Games - Edinburgh in 1970 and Christchurch in 1974.

He also coached elder son Richard to two Commonwealth Games (1990 and 1994).

Allan was coach of the national track-and-field section at the 1992 Barcelona Olympics and a national selector for two decades until 1994.

He also was president of Athletics New Zealand in 2002-03 and served on the board for eight years.

Allan was awarded an ONZM with Sylvia in 1998, a year before she died.

Richard Potts says the officials make the meeting tick.

They include Hastings club chairwoman Sharee Jones, officials Barry and Anne Jones (not related), the Andersen family of Murray, Jo, Louise, Tracy Gavin and Bruce Smith.

Napier club athletic and harriers officials, the Potts trustees, Neville Smith and Mike Kaye, and numerous other families who worked alongside Allan or received coaching from Allan have also offered to help this year, he says.

Officials from Wellington, Palmerston North, Masterson, Wanganui, Hamilton and Auckland have also added to the collective over the years.

Potts says Sir Graeme's sponsorship has enabled them to bring two Australian athletes - Corrin Demeo, 16, an 800m runner from Melbourne and Xavier Smith, 16, a 1500m specialist who is faster than Kiwi contenders - on Saturday.

The red-ribbon competition for 3 to 14-year-olds starts at midday and finishes at 4.30pm.

The seniors begin their campaign from 5.30pm before finishing with the feature Sylvia Potts classic 800m run at 7.30pm.

Cantabrian Angie Petty (nee Smit) clinched her fifth 800m classic title last year, clocking 2min 03.72sec to eclipse the mark of 2:04.08 former Olympian Sylvia Potts had set.

Pole vaulter Eliza McCartney, of Auckland, third in the world juniors, will have German Katrin Psitzner, of Auckland, to contend with.

World shotput record holder (20.70m) Jacko Gill, of Auckland, has got over 19m and will be eyeing the cash prizes and training grants the classic is offering.

At 6.50pm men will run in the 800m Allan Potts Memorial event after the Clash of the Codes 4 x 100m men's and women's relay, featuring hockey, crossfit, rugby, netball and surf lifesavers.

Gold-coin donations from entries will be split between Hawke's Bay Cancer Society and the Cranford Hospice where Allan spent his last few weeks, says Potts.