Coast paddlers beat the odds to compete at nationals

A team of Tolaga Bay Area School paddlers returned home “absolutely buzzing” after their log-jammed journey to the secondary school waka ama nationals at Lake Tikitapu, Rotorua.

A little over a month ago, after Cyclone Gabrielle swept through the region, the boys were ankle-deep in their awa, moving logs and debris and attempting to clear a path for their waka.

They needed to train for the secondary school waka ama nationals, but the boat ramp was blown out and the Ūawa River and shoreline were full of wood.

“We actually weren’t able to get out on the river until the week before the competition,” Tania Adamson said.

She is a PE teacher at Tolaga Bay Area School and is also the waka ama coach.

“We had to overcome a few hurdles just to get our boys to the competition,” Adamson said.

“We had Cyclone Gabrielle, which heavily impacted our community. Our river was and still is full of slash and lots of debris. All our Ngāti Porou East Coast sports events were cancelled for Term 1, so we haven’t had any trips or any sporting events outside of our school.”

It was far from ideal preparation, but that wasn’t going to stop the Tolaga Bay waka ama team from competing at Lake Tikitapu in Rotorua from March 27 to 31.

The local community rallied around and got them there. There was a fundraising meat raffle, financial support from school, and a grant from Sport Gisborne Tairāwhiti.

A waka ama club in Rotorua — Hei Matau Paddlers — lent the team a waka so they could train the day before the competition, as they had not had much time on the water.

And at the national waka ama event, one of the main sponsors, Bayleys, on hearing of their bravery and determination, also chipped in to help cover the team’s travel costs and provided Tolaga Bay Area School with a gazebo to use at Tikitapu.

“It was really, really nice for us to be there, to be able to bring our boys there and experience this awesome event with lots and lots of awesome people,” Adamson said.

She said other waka ama teams in Tairāwhiti had similar Gabrielle-related obstacles to overcome and the whole region had faced a lot of challenges and hardship after the cyclone.

“It was really important that we take the boys over to Rotorua and have that positive experience,” she said.

And then there was the competition itself.

The six Tolaga Bay paddlers stunned themselves and everyone else back home when they won the second division 500m final. They also made the first division 250m final.

Not bad for a school with a roll of about 280 students, at an event with 1600 paddlers from more than 100 schools around the country.

“Just even being at the competition was such a treat and then for them to do so well, we’re all absolutely buzzing,” Adamson said.

“With the good results that we had, our whole community, our school, they were absolutely buzzing too. I think it lifted some of their spirits as well.”

Olympic gold-medal-winning rower Rob Waddell, who helped facilitate this year’s secondary school waka ama nationals, said the week-long event was “incredibly uplifting”.

“You’re seeing the best of youth sport — the emotion, the thrill, the competitiveness, the fun, the camaraderie, the teamwork. It’s all the things we love about sport.”

Waddell said the massive effort from Tolaga Bay Area School to get to the event and compete, and the support shown by their community and an event sponsor, served as an important reminder for the rest of the country about how much more could still be done to help cyclone-impacted regions.

“It’s easy for us to all forget the adversity they’re facing,” Waddell said.

“For me, this was a very blunt reminder.”

A reminder with a heart-warming result.