Grant recipient Madeleine Waddell gives an update on her training and competition
Dear Perago Trust Board,
I am writing to express my gratitude for your support in my recent athletics endeavours.
Last month, I competed in the 400m at the 2024 Athletics Junior World U20 Champs in Lima, Peru.
Being 16 years of age and at really the beginning of my athletics journey, this was my first major international competition and my first opportunity to compete in the black singlet.
There were highs and lows to the competition, with a disrupted 10-day build-up due to various niggles; I was still able to throw out two lifetime best performances on competition day.
Competing in the morning heat, I lined up alongside what would be the silver medalist, bronze medalist, and fourth place. With tough competition, this pushed me into throwing out a minor PB. Coming back later that day to race the Semi-Finals as an unautomatic qualifier, I brought a fresh mindset, allowing me to smash my PB again by half a second to run a 53.5s and secure both Carleen Dilimores 41-year-old New Zealand records, U17 400m and U18 400m.
From being ranked 36th out of 60 to finishing up with 14th place, I was thrilled with the outcome and pin a lot of that to the support shown around me.I can't thank the Perago Trust board enough for supporting me to achieve my goals.
Whether it was build-up, what to do if setbacks occur, or managing myself on the day, I learned so much from this competition that I can take to future races.
Once again, a huge thank you and I look forward to keeping in touch later on.
Kind regards,
Madeleine Waddell