Dame Valerie to Receive Gold Medal Eight Years On
The presentation will take place after the women’s shot put final at the Jennian Homes New Zealand Track and Field Championships on Friday. The final will start at 5.45pm at Porritt Stadium in Hamilton.
Following recent retesting of historical samples using new technology, the previous winner of the gold has been stripped of the medal by the IAAF and the medals reallocated, moving.
The IAAF presented some upgraded medals at the recent Birmingham World Indoor Championships and encouraged national federations to find appropriate occasions to present the medals to athletes not in Birmingham.
Athletics New Zealand asked Dame Valerie and she said the most appropriate place would be at the national championships where she has won a total of 15 senior New Zealand titles.
The upgrade means that Dame Valerie now owns four successive World Indoor titles from 2008 to 2014.
Friday’s competition is also the double Olympic champion’s first competition for 18 months and the first competitive outing since the birth of her daughter in October.
It will provide a good indication of where the three-times Commonwealth champion sits heading into her fifth Commonwealth Games on the Gold Coast, sixteen years after her first.
