Fans spur Sevens star on

It's hard to go wrong when there's 30,000 fans dressed as Muppets, Lego men, astronauts, peacocks, ballerinas and pavlovas - to name a few - cheering you on in the black jersey says New Zealand Sevens player Bryce Heem.

The Northland wing was part of the victorious New Zealand Sevens team, who stole the show and won 24-7 in Saturday night's Wellington Sevens Cup final against rivals Fiji, played in front of a packed Westpac Stadium.

"The atmosphere was pretty awesome. With that many people cheering for you, you can't really go wrong," Heem said.

After two days of competing, the 23-year-old said his body was "pretty knackered" and he restricted the after-match partying to catching up with friends and relatives.

Heem burst onto the scene for the NZ Barbarians against the NZ Maori in the middle of 2010 showing great pace and elusiveness. He was included in Gordon Tietjens NZ Sevens squad in January last year following the national sevens in Queenstown.

After his stellar ITM Cup season with Northland last year, Heem had to have hand surgery but he recovered swiftly to return to the intense training regime set by Tietjens.

"My hand didn't bother me at all during the tournament. I was happy with my performance at the weekend, especially after not playing for a while," he said.

Only two days after completing round four of the HSBC Sevens World Series, Heem and the NZ Sevens team are flying out to prepare for this weekend's USA Las Vegas Sevens, the fifth round of nine-tournaments in the series.

The USA Sevens is held at Sam Boyd Stadium - the home of the University of Las Vegas Rebels football team - over two days of competition. It has been staged there since 2010.

"It's okay there - it's a lot different to every other tournament.

"The fields are really narrow because they are used for American football, so that changes our game plan slightly," he said.

However, coach Tietjens will not be wanting to change too much with the talented squad who claimed their sixth title in 13 attempts, putting New Zealand just ahead of Fiji in their bid for the overall series win.

In 15-a-side rugby, Heem came off contract this year for Northland and said he was not sure where he will go for the ITM Cup season.

"I'm currently weighing up my options," Heem said.