Source: Radio New Zealand
New Zealand high jumper Hamish Kerr is the Supreme Winner at The 63rd Halberg Awards. 2026. Andrew Cornaga/www.photosport.nz
Supreme Halberg Award winner Hamish Kerr has set himself some lofty goals to achieve over the next few years and it includes a tilt at the world record.
Kerr won the New Zealand Sportsman of the Year Award and the Supreme Award for his feats in 2025 which included winning the World Championship title for the first time and claiming the Diamond League title.
“To be honoured for those achievements (at the Halberg Awards) was very special,” Kerr told RNZ.
However, what the Olympic champion has done in the last two years is spurring him on to higher things.
The 29-year-old Cantabrian has always been motivated by jumping higher and has said with that comes results.
“I came into this sport with just this desire to want to jump higher and that is the amazing thing about athletics it is so measurable.
“That goal to see where the limit is, with how high I can jump, has not been achieved yet.”
Kerr is in the middle of a heavy training block and will open his season at the National Championships in Auckland in early March.
He will defend his Diamond League title and Commonwealth Games titles this year and improving his personal best from 2:36m to 2:40m is the aim for 2026.
Hamish Kerr during the International Athletics Meet in Christchurch, 2025. © Photosport Ltd 2025 www.photosport.nz
Only 16 men have jumped 2:40m or higher and the last person did it in 2014.
“It is definitely the target for this year and to achieve that would be an amazing honour, but we also know there is more in the tank.”
He is also inspired by the thought of challenging the world record of 2:45m set by Cuban Javier Sotomayor in 1993.
Kerr realises it would be quite an achievement, but it’s one he has put plenty of thought into.
“With my team we wrote down all the things we think we could optimise and it came out as quite a big list. So that is really gratifying to know that even after all these years there are still a lot of stones that we haven’t turned over yet.
“I think in the next few years if we can start flipping a few of those over there is a decent chance that we’ll be able to get a number of those centimetres.”
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– Published by EveningReport.nz and AsiaPacificReport.nz, see: MIL OSI in partnership with Radio New Zealand
