Sport awards: Caleb is a true sporting 'colossus'

Caleb Aperahama had an outstanding season in the Tauranga Boys' College First XV this year. Photo / John Borren

A special athlete has taken out the supreme honour at the Tauranga Boys' College Titans Sports awards held last Friday.

Caleb Aperahama, 18, was named Titans Sportsman of the Year after a truly dominant year in volleyball, beach volleyball and rugby.

The barnstorming No 8 made the Chiefs under-18 squad, was the standout player in the school's First XV rugby team, represented New Zealand in beach volleyball at under-19 and secondary school levels, and was MVP at the New Zealand Secondary Schools volleyball championships.

He also holds track and field athletics records at the school.

Tauranga Boys' director of sport, Darrell Boyd, says Aperahama is a colossus.

"The biggest thing for me is that he has overcome adversity," Boyd said. "In Year 11, he made the First XV and then had an horrific knee injury and was out for the season after one game. In Year 12, he played two games and the same injury occurred, which is a bit of a freak accident, and he was out again for the season.

"So for him to almost make the New Zealand Secondary Schools squad this year after his first full season of rugby under his belt was amazing. There are a lot of what-ifs, as I think had he played those other two years, who knows where he might have been.

"He is a natural athlete, with great [volleyball] court eye-hand co-ordination for a big fullah. He easily would have travelled away a lot more in New Zealand teams if finances allowed it - he was that good."

Tauranga Boys' annual sports awards exemplified the diversity of sporting success at the school.

Boyd says a total focus on just rugby, or a core group of sports favoured by their main rivals, is not their priority.

"We are working hard at getting better at what we do. Rugby is hard. Everyone expects us to win all the time and if we put all our eggs in the rugby basket then maybe we would.

"But the current philosophy of the school is around all sports, whether that is right or wrong.

"We can stand up and say there would not be many schools in New Zealand that have the success across a range of sports that we do."