As Michelangelo apparently said ... "The greater danger for most of us lies not in setting our aim too high and falling short; but in setting our aim too low, and achieving our mark!"
Hastings District Council's $4 million funding contribution announcement demonstrates the magnitude of positivity they know it will bring to the region, and Napier have also signalled their keen endorsement and collaboration.
With the network of buy-in extending to CHB and Wairoa, we truly do have an amazing opportunity; synergizing all of Hawke's Bay.
We have the perfect environment with a great climate that is the envy of other regions, and the right sized towns for producing natural athletes. Now we have the chance to establish the perfect system to go with it!
A facility and programmes our community will be proud of, and aspire to, and in the home-grown talent we will develop, stars to lead the way for our youth to aspire to.
The cost of providing athlete development support (physical and mental development) will be paid back to the community 10-fold through the positive impact those well-disciplined, hard-working high achievers will have on our wider communities - the shining lights to guide our youth down the right side of the train tracks.
AUT Millennium Hawke's Bay will promote sport and health as a vehicle that can break down social and cultural barriers, mixing under the one roof, united within a proud Hawke's Bay community system.
The support from all corners has been overwhelming, support from all the national sports organisations approached, excited at what our region will do for their athletes.
Schools keen to get on board to enhance their systems to provide for their kids, with two school programmes already operating and making great progress with enthusiastic students.
As is the case at AUT Millennium in Auckland, we now have the chance to have our high performers sharing facilities with, and inspiring, mass participation. In time we will be able to showcase our system as a model for other regions around the country, and the world.
Regional New Zealand is our point of difference on the international stage, and for the first time we have the chance to demonstrate how our country can really capitalise on that natural strength, by wrapping a system and pathway around our regional centres, a network linking our smallest towns to AUT Millennium and the National Training Centre in Auckland - and in doing so help flip the national Auckland centric psyche of our young people on its head, promoting regional NZ, and Hawke's Bay as a place you can be the best you can be!
What is proposed, and what Hawke's Bay have been offered is something very special, an opportunity other regions would love to have!
This will be the first outreach of the nation's mothership - AUT Millennium Hawke's Bay.
A $10 million target has been set - the region collectively now has to get behind the project to make sure it happens.
-Marcus Agnew leads Talent Development and the Pathway to Podium for Sport Hawke's Bay. He is also a lecturer in sports science at EIT.
-Business and civic leaders, organisers, experts in their field and interest groups can contribute opinions. Views expressed here are the writer's personal opinion, and not the newspaper's. Email editor@hbtoday.co.nz.
