Anne Audain

Anne Audain, born in Auckland in 1955 and raised in Otahuhu, was one of the most versatile and successful runners New Zealand ever produced. She, Lorraine Moller and Allison Roe formed a trio of women who made the world sit up and take notice with their running exploits in the early 1980s.

As she discussed in her autobiography, Uncommon Heart, Audain was adopted as a baby and born with a bone deformity in both feet. Who’d have picked then that she would go on to become one of the world’s great athletes?

Audain (née Garrett) was only 15, and had been running for just a year, when she won the Auckland senior cross-country title and placed 3rd in the Auckland women’s 800m.

The following year, she qualified for the 1972 Munich Olympics in the 800m and 1500m but, just three weeks before the Games, was withdrawn from the New Zealand team because the selectors felt she was too young for the Olympics.

At 17, she ran in the 1973 world cross-country championships in Belgium and finished a highly creditable 9th, helping New Zealand finish 6th in the teams event.

She was a student at Auckland Teachers College in 1974 when, only 18 but quickly gaining in reputation and experience, she was chosen for the Christchurch Commonwealth Games, where she made the final of the 1500m. She ran 4min 19.1s in her heat to qualify for the final, and in the final was 6th in 4min 21.1s.

In 1975, she finished 10th at the world cross-country event in Morocco in a fantastic race for New Zealand. Lorraine Moller was 5th and Heather Thomson 6th and the New Zealand team, which also included Allison Deed (later Roe) and Dianne Zorn (later Rodger) came 2nd, just edged out of 1st place by the USA. The New Zealand men’s team won the world teams title that year in Morocco.

At the 1976 Montreal Olympics, by which time Audain was a primary school teacher, she was not able to advance past the heats in the 800m or 1500m, though she broke the New Zealand 1500m record with 4min 10.68s.

She competed in the world cross-country championship in Germany in 1977, and again performed with distinction, finishing 9th. Two years later, when the event was in Ireland, she was 14th. In 1981, she was 27th in Spain.

In her early days Audain was coached by former British star Gordon Pirie, and she had plenty of success, with national 800m titles in 1976 and 1978, 1500m titles in 1976, 1979 and 1980, as well as the national road title in 1972 and 1973.

But along the way she lost confidence and enjoyment in her running and it was really only when John Davies took over as her coach that she blossomed into a world star.

Audain was certainly never afraid of hard training and by the time she’d decided to head to the US in the 1981, basing herself in Denver, Colorado, she was a vastly improved athlete.

Audain, Moller and Roe led a new generation of New Zealand women runners and openly pushed for professionalism to replace the ‘shamateur’ system in which athletes were paid under the counter. The trio’s joint announcement that they would accept prizemoney at the 1981 Cascade Run Off in Oregon was a key moment in pushing athletics into the era of open competition. It was a bold and brave stand when no-one knew what the repercussions would be. Indeed they were all banned by the Athletics New Zealand for a time, until the situation became farcical and the officials relented.

In very little time Audain became one of the leaders on the lucrative US road racing circuit. With her endurance and sharp speed she had too many weapons for most other distance runners.

She went through the entire all of 1982 unbeaten – on the roads and the track.

It was on the track in 1982 that enjoyed arguably her finest hour, when she ran brilliantly to win the 3000m at the 1982 Brisbane Commonwealth Games.

She hinted at what was to come when she broke the women’s 5000m world record in Auckland in March 1982. The distance was only just starting to be run competitively by women, but Audain’s time of 15min 13.22s was still decidedly slippery.

The 3000m, on the second day of track and field in Brisbane, was run as a straight final with 17 starters. In Moller, Anne Audain and Dianne Rodger, New Zealand had an impressive trio of runners. Insiders felt Audain was the favourite. Her lead-up training form in Melbourne was outstanding, and included an unofficial New Zealand record in the 1500m.

At the gun, Audain sprinted to the front, perhaps to steer clear of trouble in the packed field. Behind her was the well-performed Englishwoman Wendy Smith and they soon separated themselves from the chasers.

Audain dictated the pace, withstood a challenge from Smith with 200m remaining and sprinted to the line to finish with a sizzling time of 8min 45.53s. Moller fought back over the last two laps to grab the bronze medal in 8min 55.76s and Rodger was fourth. All four women broke the Games record. Moller and Rodger lifted Audain down the straight, acknowledging the cheers.

Audain’s winning time stood as the New Zealand record for 25 years until Kim Smith beat it in 2007.

Besides pulling in the victories, and the cash, on the roads, Audain focused on the marathon, eyeing the 1984 Olympics, in which the marathon would feature for the first time on the women’s schedule. She’d have preferred the 5000m or 10,000m, but they weren’t included.

Audain ran 2h 32.15s in the 1983 Chicago marathon, at the time the fastest women’s debut marathon ever. Though it beat the Olympic qualifying mark, she was told she had to run another qualifying time, so she did, in the 1984 Los Angeles Marathon.

She suffered from dehydration during the Olympic marathon and withdrew at the 21km mark, and was hospitalised.

While she continued to prosper on the American roads, she but found time to contest the 1986 Commonwealth Games 10,000m, where she claimed the silver medal in 31min 53.31s, 12 seconds behind Liz Lynch (later McColgan) of Scotland.

In the 1988 Olympics, her last, she finished 11th in the inaugural 10,000m in 32min 10.47s.

Audain continued to return to New Zealand regularly and added more national titles to her collection – 5000m in 1987 and 10,000m in 1990. She’d hoped to close out her career in triumph at the 1990 Commonwealth Games in her home town, but had to make do with 11th in the 10,000m in 33min 40.13s.

She remained in the US as her career would down, founding the Idaho Women's Fitness Celebration 5K in Boise in 1993. It became biggest 5000m race for women in the USA, at its peak attracting 17.000 entrants.

Audain was honoured for her career in many ways. She was awarded the New Zealand 1990 Commemoration Medal and in 1995 received the MBE.

In 2008, Audain was inducted into the Running USA Hall of Champions, and the following year she was voted into the New Zealand Sports Hall of Fame.