College sport: Paddling champ shines

By JENNI RUTHERFORD

World champion paddler Nancy Rae Tarawa showed she was on course for glory at this year's world championships, early next month, when she flexed her muscles at the Eastland waka ama secondary school championships.

The Lytton High student spearheaded the senior girls race, helping the team to first place.

Tarawa, the best in the world in the under-16 W1 class, will be in unfamiliar waters when she competes in Bora Bora, Tahiti, racing in the under-19 grade.

She plans to compete in the W1, 1000m and 500m teams event and the W12 - in which teams of 12 race in an outrigger with six competitors on each side. New Zealand are sending a team of 42.

Lytton also won the mixed teams event, while Gisborne Boys High took out the senior boys event.

EQUESTRIAN

Waikato Diocesan held on to the Waikato inter-secondary schools show-jumping title for the second year in a row yesterday.

Diocesan pipped Te Kauwhata High by five points. Cambridge High took third. Cambridge's Nikki MacKintosh finished the day with the top senior points score ahead of Emma Gaze (Sacred Heart, Hamilton) and Diocesan's Katie McVean.

VOLLEYBALL

National senior girls champions Otumoetai College look a promising prospect for higher honours after emerging undefeated from the first round of the Bay of Plenty top 12 secondary schools championships.

Trident High are in second place after suffering one loss from four matches, but have yet to face Otumoetai's top team.

Tauranga Girls College and Western Heights share third.

The Western Heights senior boys team also maintained a clean slate after four matches and appear poised to qualify for division one at the national tournament in March. Tauranga Boys College, Trident and Otumoetai are likely to battle it out for the last two spots after winning two out of their four matches. Two rounds remain. The next meeting is in Rotorua on Friday.

ATHLETICS

Qualification for the Waikato secondary school championships will be most athletes' main concern at the mid-island meet on Tuesday, but some young elite competitors aim to clock close to world junior championship times.

Forest View High's Monique Williams is one who will be using the championships as a training run for her bid to qualify in the 400m and 800m for July's world junior (under-20) championships in Jamaica.

Williams, who finished eighth in the 800m final at the world youth (under-18) championships in Hungary last year, will have had a busy week, as she is also competing in the national club championships on Friday. She needs smart times of 54.64s for 400m and 2m 07s for 800m to be selected as part of the NZ team to go to the Caribbean.

Other promising performances are expected from Lake Taupo Christian School's Holly McCullum in the intermediate girls 100m and 200m.

Rotorua Boys High's Ben McHale is another who is tipped to stand out in the senior boys 800m and 1500m events.

SURFING

The Northland team appear on track to better last year's sixth place finish at the national scholastic championships, if the calibre of the turn out at the Northland secondary school championships is anything to go by.

More than 70 surfers competed in six divisions in favourable but changeable surf are Rarawa Beach in Kaitaia.

Whangarei Boys High's Joseph Carroll was the standout in a very competitive under-18 boys division.

Daniel Bird of Kaitaia College won the under-16 boys grade ahead of Kamo High's Zal Fergusson, but both were selected to represent the region.

Defending champion Thandi Durham of Raglan Area School used her experience and big-wave confidence to secure her second under-19 girls title and a place on the Northland team.

Today:

Northland: south zone cricket.

Eastland: beach volleyball tournament.

Tomorrow:

Northland: south zone athletics.

Waikato: King Country secondary schools swimming championships.

Friday:

Northland: Northland secondary schools sailing regatta, Parua Bay.

Eastland: volleyball seeding tournament.

Bay of Plenty: volleyball top 12 championships, Rotorua.

Waikato: Thames Valley inter-collegiate fours, Waikato secondary schools tennis.

Saturday:

Northland: Northland secondary schools beach volleyball championships.

Monday:

Waikato: Thames Valley secondary schools show-jumping championships, Paeroa.

Tuesday:

Northland: junior cricket.

Bay of Plenty: mid-island athletics championships, Taupo.

Waikato: central zone secondary school athletics, Hamilton.