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The medal potential of three of New Zealand's six targeted Olympic sports have been recognised with funding top-ups ahead of London.
The newly created High Performance Sport New Zealand, a subsidiary of Sparc, yesterday announced 2012 "contestable" and "targeted" sports investments.
The keenest interest was in which Olympic sports would receive extra cash and which, by elimination, have failed to impress the country's funding czars.
Sailing, cycling and particularly rowing have been the winners. Sailing received an extra $100,000, bike $200,000 and rowing was a big winner with an extra half million to take them to $4.82 million.
The flip side was triathlon, swimming and athletics which received no top-ups for their respective $1.585 million, $1.65 million and $1.8 million funds.
"They applied for a little bit, and it was a little bit, but what we've said to them is 'go back and have a look and see if you can re-prioritise from within your existing budget'," said Martin Toomey, acting CEO of HPSNZ. "While these investment decisions are focused on 2012, we are also signalling support for sports which we expect to prove strong competition for our sporting rivals in 2016."
The clear winners in the contestable funding were the men's and women's hockey campaigns. As a result of their top six placings at the Champions Trophy, they have each received a $300,000 funding boost. The women now have a budget of $1.2 million, $100,000 more than the men.
"It's significant in terms of both men's and women's hockey," Toomey said. "You think women's hockey - two or three years ago we were talking about giving them nothing. I remember talking about it. Now we're talking $1.2 million going into that programme.
"That's a big step forward."
Hockey was at a low ebb after the women lost every game and finished with the wooden spoon in Beijing. The men finished seventh, but at least were competitive.
Since then, hockey has turned itself around both on and off the field and are now genuine medal prospects in London, particularly the women. Olympic team sports are the most difficult to fund as they are hugely expensive and there are only six medals up for grabs.
Toomey, who departs HPSNZ in January to head up New Zealand's snow sports programme, said the $4.6 million of new funding had "stretched the budget significantly".
"You look at rowing and bike in particular, their programmes now are huge. They're trying to put entries in every Olympic discipline there is. If you think where we've come from, even in Beijing, that's massive but it comes at a cost.
"That's a lot of international competition, equipment, coaching. It's a reflection of how well they're performing when you look at what it costs to run those programmes."
Looking beyond the London Olympics, HPSNZ announced that sevens would receive $1.75 million in 2013 as it begins to gear itself up for a tilt at the 2016 Rio de Janeiro Olympics.
Total funding for high-performance plans is almost $30 million. When individual grants, scholarships and performance services like physiotherapy and nutrition are taken into account, the total is closer to $50 million.