Tomas Walsh (born 1 March 1992)[1] is a New Zealand athlete who competes mainly in the shot put.[2] He is the current national record holder both outdoors and indoors for the event.[3][4] His personal best of 22.90 m (75 ft 1+1⁄2 in), set in Doha, 5 October 2019, is also the Oceanian record and makes him the sixth best shot putter in history.
Walsh made his international debut at the 2009 World Youth Championships in Athletics, where he placed sixth in his shot put speciality and also competed in the qualifying of the discus throw.[5] On 12 December 2009 Walsh recorded a put of 20.21 m (66 ft 3+1⁄2 in) the 5 kg shot to win the Senior Boys title at the New Zealand National Secondary School Track and Field Championships. This performance was a New Zealand Youth (Under 18) record which was broken the following day by Jacko Gill when winning the Junior Boys (Under 16) title.
Walsh broke the New Zealand junior record on 18 March 2010 with a put of 18.82 m (61 ft 8+3⁄4 in) with the 6 kg shot but this was broken 9 days later by Gill with 19.92 m (65 ft 4+1⁄4 in). At the 2010 World Junior Championships in Athletics Walsh failed to qualify for the final of the shot put which was won by Gill.[6][7][8]
In 2012 Walsh won his first senior national shot put title which he retained the following season and also added the discus title. On 12 December 2013 Walsh broke Gill's New Zealand senior shot put record with 20.61 m (67 ft 7+1⁄4 in) in Melbourne, Australia[9] which he improved with 21.16 m (69 ft 5 in) on 22 March 2014, also in Melbourne.[10]
At the 2014 IAAF World Indoor Championships, in his first senior international competition and first ever competition indoors,[11] Walsh finished third in the men's shot put.[12] He set an indoor national record of 20.41 m (66 ft 11+1⁄2 in) in the qualifying round and improved upon this mark three times in the final finishing with 21.26 m (69 ft 9 in) which was an Oceanian indoor record and the same distance as the Oceanian outdoor record.[4][13]
In 2015, Walsh defended his New Zealand shot put title with a throw of 20.73 m (68 ft 0 in) on 8 March,[17] before setting a new Oceanian record of 21.37 m (70 ft 1+1⁄4 in) on 21 March at the Melbourne Track Classic.[18]
Walsh finished fourth at the 2015 World Championships on 23 August in Beijing, throwing a new personal best of 21.58m.[19] He was just 11 cm off the bronze medal. He improved his personal best to 21.62m on 8 September in winning the shot put at the Hanžeković Memorial in Zagreb.[20] On 11 September Walsh won his first Diamond League meet with a throw of 21.39m in Brussels.[21]
Walsh retained his World Indoor title at the 2018 World Indoor Championships, with a then personal best of 22.31m. He surpassed this with 22.67m on 25 March the same year, at the Sir Graeme Douglas International Track Challenge in West Auckland, New Zealand, moving him into the top-10 World All-Time.
