Future Stars Awards: Recognising tomorrow's sporting greats

Jockey James McDonald. Photo / Dean Purcell

The honours keep coming for top jockey James McDonald. The outstanding 18-year-old yesterday joined other outstanding sportsmen and women as a New Zealand Herald Future Stars award winner.

It is the first time in the long history of the awards the "sport of kings" has been a winner.

Joining McDonald as Herald/Millennium Institute of Sport and Health award winners, receiving a trophy, product pack and $1500 training grant, are world yachting champions Bianca Barbarich-Bacher and Alex Maloney, Black Stick Gemma Flynn, kayaker/surf lifesaver Teneale Hatton, Paralympic swimmer Cameron Leslie and junior world cycling champion Sam Webster.

McDonald made an instant impact on the tough world of thoroughbred racing.

He won the McBeath Trophy as the country's leading apprentice in his first two seasons, upstaging his older and more experienced rivals to claim the premiership as the leading jockey in the 2008-09 season, winning 125 races and $2,564,290 in stakemoney.

Barbarich-Bacher and Maloney follow 2006 world 420 champions Carl Evans and Peter Burling as the second yachting crew to be recognised.

In difficult conditions on Lake Garda, Italy, in August the pair overcame a potential disaster in the last race to claim the world 420 championship.

That win after a ripped spinnaker in the last race, which dropped them back to 16th but still allowed them to claim the championship by nine points, followed an earlier fourth placing in the ISAF Volvo Youth World Championships in Brazil.

Flynn arrived back from Perth yesterday after a disappointing series loss to Australia. But, at just 19 years of age, Flynn, with nearly 40 caps, was one of the more experienced players in the young team.

She has been a key member of Mark Hager's national side, playing a big part in the team's success at last year's Champions Challenge tournament, where Flynn was named player of the tournament. She was also a finalist in the Junior World Player of the Year.

Hatton has flat water kayaking at the 2012 and 2016 Olympics in her sights.

A member of the Orewa Surf Lifesaving Club for 11 of her 20 years, she has excelled at both disciplines.

She had success in surf ski events at lifesaving championships and in K1, K2 and K4 races over 500m and 1000m both nationally and internationally.

A carded athlete through Sparc in both sports, Hatton followed her success at the 2008 Hungarian flatwater nationals in 2008 with victory in the K1 1000m at last January's Australian Youth Olympic Festival. She later won seven medals at the New Zealand championships before going on to claim podium finishes in a variety of disciplines on the World Cup circuit.

Leslie was born with a congenital disability which severely affected all four limbs. As an 18-year-old at the Beijing Paralympics, he won gold in world record time in the 150m individual medley. A year on, he won gold, silver and bronze medals at the 2009 world championships with a second world record.

Webster left for last year's junior world cycling championships in Moscow a virtual unknown.

Not for long. In an amazing effort he won the hotly-contested individual sprint. Unbeaten in all rounds, Webster clocked 10.205s for the flying 200m - the fastest time ever ridden by a New Zealander.

The winners, their parents and coaches will be guests of the Herald and the Millennium Institute for a special lunch at which they will be presented with their awards.