Editorial: A lifetime devoted to athletics

Allan Potts

When you enter the name of Hastings athletics stalwart Allan Potts in Hawke's Bay Today's digital archives, it fetches 137 hits.

The enormous cache mentions his involvement in pre-and-post athletics meetings, innumerable plaudits, accolade upon accolade and awards from the sporting community, wider community and state.

Sadly the latest entry was his funeral on Tuesday after succumbing to cancer, aged 79.

I was fortunate enough to attend school with Allan's son, Richard "Potzee" Potts, (who shared the same moniker as his father) a freakishly gifted runner whose average speed for the 1500m was the same pace I ran the 200m.

So swift was he, we often joked Potzee junior was taking performance enhancing drugs.

It wasn't until much later I realised his talent had everything to do with pedigree.

Due to my own involvement with athletics I also had the privilege of an association with Allan and his wife, Sylvia Potts, both of whom I discovered competed at elite levels of athletics. The pair later used their grasp of the sport to impart speed and passion to the next generation. Sifting through our archives yesterday afternoon reinvigorated my admiration of this man.

Following Sylvia's death in 1999, he contemplated waving goodbye to the coaching caper.

But he endured and continued to toil with "grass roots" athletics, rather than coaching only those who could pay for the privilege.

In one story in 2005 he said: "We would never charge ... I've got a group of 27 athletes ... if I started charging as a professional coach I believe you'd cut that [number] down significantly. I'm more interested in grassroots and getting people involved".

It was a selfless focus this writer simply can't relate to - a literal track record of which we'll never see the likes again.