New Zealand's world No 1 shot putter Valerie Vili likes the word "ginormous". She uses it to describe both the size of the Bird's Nest and the significance of the Commonwealth Games back home.

It's a fitting word for her as well - it describes both her intimidating physique and the scale of her athletic accomplishments.

Vili is an athlete nearly impossible to miss. At 1.96m - her height since she was 12 - the 23-year-old towers over her opponents. Her big frame and long limbs are part of what helped her become the reigning shot put world champion, the Commonwealth Games record holder, and New Zealand's sportsperson of the year for 2007.

"I'm a power athlete," she said shortly after claiming gold at last week's China Athletics Open. "(Shot put) is a power event - you have to be very dynamic but very strong at the same time to throw."

Her powerful endowments may have shot her into the athletics elite, but her height was the target of much derision when she was growing up in Mangere, a suburb south of Auckland. Shy and awkward and afraid of attracting attention, she favored team sports like basketball and rugby in her early teens.

But when Vili was 13, her P.E. instructor told her she would be throwing the shot put at that day's track meet because, she said, she "was just the biggest kid at school". She ended up breaking a decades-old regional schools record. It was as if she was born to throw the shot.

"It's definitely not a glamour event, not like sprinting or javelin," she said. "I think from a long time ago it's been labeled by other people as being a 'butch' event because of the big butch women who throw itbut now there's more feminine people out there throwing."

"You sort of, not learn to love, you choose to love the event, and I absolutely adore the shot."

Her love of the shot did not really start to develop until about six months later when she was introduced to former New Zealand Olympic javelin thrower and Commonwealth silver medalist Kirsten Hellier. The coach knew very little about shot put at the time, but Valerie's obvious physical gifts convinced her to learn.

With her coach by her side, Vili started racking up youth and junior world titles. Hellier's athletics expertise went far, but it was her ability to pull Valerie out of her shell and teach her to feel comfortable in her own body that made Vili the athlete she is today.

"She's helped me give myself confidence, to be proud of who I am and my height and everything, so I owe that all to her," Vili said.

"We have a very special bond that I don't think many athletes and coaches have. She's not only my coach, she's a very good friendwe're almost like family."

Their familial ties are hardly an exaggeration. After Vili's mother died of cancer in September 2000, the then 15-year-old turned to her coach for emotional support. Not long afterward, she moved in with Hellier and her husband.

Her mother's death motivated Vili make something of herself as an athlete. It did not take long for her to do her mother proud.

At 17, Valerie, whose surname was Adams before she married discus thrower Bertrand Vili in 2004, came within 8 cm of winning gold at the 2002 Manchester Commonwealth Games. Four years later in Melbourne, she got her gold with a throw of 19.66 m, the current Commonwealth record.

She made her Olympic debut in Athens, where she finished eighth. It was a wonder she even made it to Greece, having had an appendectomy only a week before the Games began. But Vili said it was her inexperience that hurt her most that year.

"At Athens I was 19 years old. I was young and immature and not used to top-level competition."

While she says the Olympics is "the pinnacle of your sporting career, the crme de la crme", she can name the high point of her career so far without hesitation:

"Last year at Osaka, absolutely," she said, referring to the world championship title she won by setting an Oceania record and a personal best with a 20.54-m throw. She became just the second Kiwi to win a senior world track and field title and later won the 2007 Halberg Award, New Zealand's top sporting honor.

But it wasn't the honors or accolades that made the Osaka win so special for Vili; it was her triumph over personal struggles. First her father died of stomach cancer. Then she had major shoulder surgery ("they had to cut a couple centimeters off my clavicle"). But she bounced back.

"To be able to get my (act) together within a few months was just awesome and amazing," she said.

Vili has increased her personal best every year since she began throwing, and since most shot putters don't reach their prime until their 30s, chances are she will continue to improve.

She is currently tweaking her throwing style to get those extra centimeters. If she hopes to edge out people like her Belarusian archrival Nadzeya Ostapchuk (personal best 21.09 m) in August, she'll have to come up with something ginormous.

(China Daily 05/30/2008 page14)