KEY POINTS:
Valerie Vili came in the mood to party. As she warmed up for the shot put at the Black Singlet Invitational athletics event in Auckland last night, a smile sneaked on to her face and it was obvious the world champion thrower was determined to have a special
night.
The celebrations for scooping the supreme award in the Halberg Sports Awards were to come later - first she wanted to give the crowd which had come to the Douglas Track & Field Stadium for the IAAF-sanctioned meeting a few thrills.
They didn't have to wait long. The 23-year-old hurled her second-round throw out to a season best 20.13m, marking the effort with leaps and jumps of joy.
Not content with beating 20m for the first time this season once, she threatened to do it again.
Two more rounds bettered 19m, before her sixth put soared to 20.09m, sending her dashing to her coach, Kirsten Hellier and husband Bertrand Vili, where they wooped and hugged.
Her 20.13m winning throw was just 7cm short of her women's allcomers and resident record set in 2006, and was a world best for this season.
Vili's victory was never under threat, with Kristin Heaston of the United States second with 17.66m and Tonga's Ana Po'uhila, 17.37m, third.
"I'm very happy about where I am at the moment - we're in February and that is a pretty good start," Vili said.
The performance came despite a niggling back injury caused when she slipped over doing sprint drills on wet grass last week. She is still receiving treatment but doesn't expect it to trouble her as she builds up to the world indoor champs next month.
In other events, the crowd was also treated to another top performance from an athlete hoping to join Vili in Beijing for the Olympics in August.
Sprinter James Dolphin, undefeated over 200m in Australia and New Zealand this season, powered away to win in 20.74s, the fastest he has run in New Zealand and an Olympic B standard time to back up the A standard he ran last month. Jeffrey Thumath, of Counties Manukau, was second in 20.97s.
"I was a little bit surprised because I'm still feeling a bit jaded with the baby," said Dolphin, whose wife gave birth to their second son three weeks ago.
In the javelin, Hamilton's Stuart Farquhar fought for his 75.15m effort for third. Australia's Jarrod Bannister won with 81.33m, followed by American Mike Hazle with 77.54m.
"It was pretty tricky out there with the winds swirling around left to right," said Farquhar, who hit an A-standard Olympic qualifying throw in Australia last month, an effort which he said had taken pressure off him.
Former discus world champion Beatrice Faumuina (58.47m) was second behind Australian Dani Samuels (60.11m).
She will compete in Melbourne on Thursday as she seeks to emulate her Olympic-qualifying throw of last year and prove her case for inclusion in the Beijing team.
