Swimming

After an extremely disruptive 2020 for our swimmers with multiple meets being cancelled and much time out of the pool, we hoped 2021 was going to be a more successful sporting year for everyone.

The first College Sport meet for the 2021 year (North Harbour Zone Day) was once again disrupted due to a snap lockdown. This was short and sharp, thank goodness, and rescheduled to allow our swimmers to get in the pool and race. Rangitoto quickly positioned itself as a dominating force amongst the other Northern Region schools by securing top selection spots in many of the individual and relay races at this zone day which was a qualifier into the next round.

Next on the College Sport calendar was the All Zone competition in April which was held at Diocesan. This resulted in six gold, four silver and one bronze in the individual events followed up by an impressive six golds, one silver and one bronze in the relays. Our swimmers then got back on the blocks for the College Sport Champions of Champions meet, not more than 10 days later, to secure another two gold, six silver and one bronze in the individual events with another four gold and one bronze in the relays.

The final College Sport event of the year, Individual Champs, produced once again another stellar performance by our swimmers who clearly saved the best till last with 16 gold, eight silver and four bronze medal finishers.

Outside of college swimming some of our athletes competed in national and regional meets throughout the year, many which had been cancelled in 2020 due to Covid-19. New Zealand Opens in March was the first of the national meets on the competition calendar with our Age Group swimmers using this meet as a practice run in the lead up to the National Age group Championships scheduled in the April school holidays. Fast forward to the first week of the April school holidays where 14 of our swimmers took to the water at the New Zealand National Age Group Champs in Wellington. This meet is the pinnacle event in an Age Group swimmer’s journey and they did not disappoint. In total our athletes returned home after five days of racing with an impressive 17 New Zealand National Individual Age Group titles.

The swimming year was not over yet with the next big event in sight, New Zealand Secondary School Championships. 2020 was a big act to follow going into this year’s meet as defending champions of this competition, but defend they did. This group of exceptional athletes once again secured the 2021 New Zealand Top Co-Ed School for the second year in a row.

This 31 strong swim team dominated from the get go by nailing multiple relay podium finishes on day one of the meet setting the scene for a big few days ahead. Rangitoto meant business and with 206 individual swims during the meet and 30 relays resulting in total points of 1607, well ahead of second place Mt Albert Grammar on 677, there was never any doubt that this dream team were going to come away as New Zealand Secondary School Champions again.

Not only did the school secure the Top Co-Ed School trophy but we also secured the Girls Relay trophy which was last year won by Diocesan School for Girls.

In summary Rangitoto College came away with:

Individual medals

13 Gold (NZ Secondary School Champions) 13 Silver 8 Bronze

Relay medals

4 Gold 4 Silver 6 Bronze