Summer sports

SUMMER SPORT ROUND-UP

ATHLETICS

With an event-filled calendar, the first term was a busy time for athletics. Our girls had a great season, with many personal bests broken. A group of five girls attended the North Island competition in Hamilton including Lucy Shennan (gold – 800m), Sonya Ha, Maddie Kelso-Heap (bronze – 300m hurdles), Elizabeth Peters (bronze – 80m hurdles) and Jacqui Nasrabadi. Dio also had great success at the Auckland Schools’ Athletics Championships where we won 11 medals. Our top results at the Auckland Championships were:

Junior Girls

Jacqui Nasrabadi – 300m 3rd, long jump 3rd Amy Shennan – 1500m 3rd

Intermediate Girls

Lucy Shennan – 800m 1st Maddie Kelso-Heap – 300m hurdles 1st Lucy Shennan – 400m 2nd Maddie Kelso-Heap – 200m 3rd Elizabeth Peters – 80m hurdles 3rd

Senior Girls

Arabella White – 800m 3rd Amelia Green – 1500m 3rd

CRICKET

Our 1st XI cricketers competed at the Girls’ Cricket T20 National Qualifier Tournament at Lloyd Elsmore Park, where they finished in eighth place. Well done girls and many thanks to coach Roy Goodyear and manager Bryan Haggitt.

Congratulations also to Tessa Dysel who has been selected into the New Zealand Maori Squad.

Dragon boating

The 2021 dragon boating season started off with lots of training at Lake Pupuke and online gym sessions through both lockdowns. The girls finally made it down to Lake Hood in Ashburton for the NZ Dragon Boating National Championships. Many of Dio’s team of 11 girls had never competed in a race before as our regional regatta was cancelled due to COVID-19. Despite being a small crew with not much experience, the team placed fourth and fifth in their 200m and 500m small boat races over the two-day regatta.

Futsal

Well done to our Junior A futsal team on their performance at the New Zealand Secondary Schools’ Futsal Championships held in Wellington. After losing a tough final game against St Andrew’s College, Dio was awarded the silver medal. Our young Senior A team topped the table in pool play, lost their next match, and ended up finishing a very respectable eleventh out of 24 teams.

Special mention to superstar Junior A goalkeeper Lily Double who was voted Goalkeeper of the Tournament.

Left: Silver medallists, Dio Junior A futsal team. Below: Lily Double, Goalkeeper of the Tournament.

FENCING

During the April school holidays, Chantelle May competed in a couple of major fencing events. She did extremely well, finishing first in both the U-17 Women’s Foil Championship held in Auckland on 17 April and the NZ U-17 Women’s Foil competition held in Wellington on 26 April. Congratulations Chantelle!

SAILING

The Dio sailing team had a great term on the water. The team of Sophie Cooke, Lydia Zhu, Lucy Tucker, Zara Tucker, Alex Cooke, Georgia Rae, Isla Barker and Lizzie Shapland finished second girls’ school at the Auckland Championships. Annabel Duff jumped in the boat for Georgia for Nationals where the girls fought hard over a week-long schedule of racing. They improved each day and showed resilience out on the water for full days. The girls ended up in fourth place, only two wins from third placed Napier Girls.

Below: Dio sailors Lydia Zhu, Alex Cooke, Lizzie Shapland, Zara Tucker, Isla Barker, Lucy Tucker, Sophie Cooke and Annabel Duff. Top Dio swimmers Lucy McKinnon, Aimee Crosbie and Jesse Welsh.

SWIMMING

A team of 19 swimmers qualified for the Auckland Champion of Champions finals. Captains Jesse Welsh and Aimee Crosbie led the way, picking up a series of individual medals. Aimee won double gold in the 50m butterfly and 50m freestyle and Jesse won gold in the 50m backstroke and bronze in the 50m freestyle. Lucy McKinnon won silver in the 50m breaststroke. We had a host of placings in the relays, with two golds, three silvers and a bronze.

At the National Orienteering Clubs’ Championships held in Auckland in March, Lucy Russ (12 RO) representing Auckland Orienteering Club, and our orienteering code captain, led by example, winning the Women’s U-18 sprint race, as well as coming fourth in the middle-distance event. Aless Nicholson (7RO) competed in her first ever club national competition and came fourth in the U-12 Women’s sprint event.

Following on from that, the Auckland Schools’ Sprint Series final was held in April. Dio had four girls compete – Lucy Russ (12RO), Sienna

Top Dio swimmers Aimee Crosbie, Jesse Welsh and Lucy McKinnon have re-qualified for the Swimming New Zealand Development Squad.

Aimee Crosbie was also selected as one of 10 girls on the New Zealand Junior team to compete at the Junior Pan Pacific Games in the 100m butterfly and the 4x100m freestyle relay. However due to COVID-19 and the cancellation of many domestic and international meets, this team is unable to compete.

Payne (10MP), Siobhan Murphy (9SE) and Aless Nicholson (7RO). Lucy Russ had two close races and finished second overall in the Year 12-13 age group. Well done to all the girls.

The Dio orienteering team then competed at the North Island Orienteering Championships in Palmerston North. Intermediate age group runners Amelia McIntosh and Sienna Payne raced in the senior relay team with Lucy Russ, completing an extraordinary race and finishing in second place overall.

Orienteering coach Cameron L’Isle with Sienna Payne, Lucy Russ and Amelia McIntosh. Orienteering

Georgia Hair

TRIATHLON

This year the Diocesan triathlon team has brought home some amazing results thanks to the support of our coaches. At the Auckland Triathlon Championships Georgia Hair (U-19) placed third, Molly Sherrard (U-14) placed second, Indie Williams (U-14) placed third and in the U-19 relay team, Aimee Crosbie, Kate Shanley and Lauren Williams placed second.

Dio had a team of girls compete at the New Zealand Secondary Schools’ Triathlon Nationals held in New Plymouth. In the U-12 age group Madeleine Worral placed sixth and Alice Wellington 11th. In the U-14s, Molly Sherrard placed 15th and in in the U-19s Georgia Hair placed ninth and Juliet Harland 18th.

Georgia Hair has been selected by Team New Zealand for the Sprint Triathlon Series in Bermuda.

TENNIS

Thirty-six girls were part of the development squad and made fast progress each week with their improvement clearly showing. Overall, the tennis season was rewarding to players of all levels. Our strong work ethic shone through in our results with the highlights being the Premier team easily winning the A2 grade and Jessica Druskovich (10NE) making it to the quarter finals in the Junior College Sport Champion of Champions competition and reaching the semifinals for the doubles with Chloe Rawlence (7ED).

Jessica Druskovich played in a couple of regional junior tennis tournaments held during the school holidays and enjoyed some great successes. At Auckland Jess was runner-up in the U-14 singles, and in Albany she was runner-up in the U-14 singles and doubles. Her doubles partner at Albany was Poppy Tingey (10MI). Also competing during the holidays, was Chloe Rawlence who won the Canterbury U-12 Doubles, and Luca Shortall (8NE) who finished runner-up at Auckland in the 5th Graded Girls’ event.

Right: Chloe Rawlence and Jessica Druskovich. Below: Poppy Tingey and Jessica Druskovich.

Water polo

COLLEGE SPORT

Dio had five teams entered into the senior water polo College Sport competition across three grades – Premier, Senior A and Senior B. In our Senior B competition both teams did extremely well with the Blue team winning the grade and the Red team placing third. In the Senior A competition our Senior B team placed fifth and our Senior A team won this division, completing the College Sport season undefeated. The Premier water polo team also completed an undefeated season, which meant that they took the Premier title for the fourth year in a row. This completed a clean sweep of titles for Dio water polo.

NORTH ISLAND SECONDARY SCHOOLS’ CHAMPIONSHIPS

Diocesan had an outstanding performance in the North Island Championship with two Dio teams finishing in the top four of the Premier Grade. This was the first time in history that any school has achieved this. The Premier team remained unbeaten throughout and came away with the gold medal, beating Rangitoto 13-6 in the final. The Senior A team came agonisingly close to winning a medal but ended up fourth after a close loss to the St Cuthbert’s Premier team. At the Division 2 Tournament, the Diocesan Senior B team made it all the way to the final, unfortunately losing to the Mount Maunganui College Premier team.

NEW ZEALAND SECONDARY SCHOOLS’ CHAMPIONSHIPS

Our Premier and Senior A water polo teams competed in these championships over the last week of the school holidays here in Auckland. Senior A had a fantastic tournament playing against premier teams from all over the country. However, as they were a second team, they placed fourth automatically in their poo,l meaning they couldn’t progress into playoffs above 13th. In their pool play the girls lost by one goal to St Cuthbert’s Premier and also drew against Westlake Girls and Rangi Ruru from Christchurch. The girls played outstanding water polo for the rest of the week, earning the bowl at the end of the tournament.

Senior A team: Sydney Bell, Tyler Butler, Neve Cobham, Isabella Dalton, Ava Darbyshire, Arabella Duncan, Billie Frecker Netten, Sophia Jackson, Louise Masefield, Ellie Millard, Lucia Partigliani, Jenna Veal and Vita Yarrell-Stevenson.

Our Premier water polo team played some top-quality water polo over the tournament where their high standard of play meant that all their opposing teams needed to bring on their best game. The girls were dominant throughout the tournament and got through to play in the final vs Rangitoto College for the third time in a finals position this year. The girls were excited to be defending their national title here at school in their own pool and after four quarters of play they were crowned victorious, taking their fourth back-toback title. Congratulations also to Sophie Shorter-Robinson for being named the tournament’s Most Valuable Player.

Premier team: Lauren Batchelor, Hannah Bell, Isabella Broadmore, Isabella Dalton, Georgia Daly, Isobella Francis, Sophie Gardiner, Emma Gilleece, Ruby Helm, Isabelle Jackson, Lara Johns, Kasey McDowall, Millie Quin, Sophie ShorterRobinson.

Dio Premier water polo team.

Dio Senior A water polo team

Ella Ross, Sophie Ryan and Charlie Barclay, U-18 North Island team members.

U-17 coxed quad

U-17 coxed eight

ROWING

Dio rowers competed at the New Zealand Secondary Schools’ Rowing Championships (Maadi Cup) held at Lake Karapiro during Summer Tournament Week.

Special congratulations to the following girls who won silver medals in two of the A Finals:

U-17 coxed quad (Natalie Kirke, Lucy Pettit, Sara MacGillivray, Eva Colyer + Sophie Ryan) and the U-17 coxed eight (Natalie Kirke, Serena Bhindi, Charlie Barclay, Natalie Spillane, Jasmine Ireland, Sara MacGillivray, Eva Colyer, Lucy Pettit + Sophie Ryan)

Due to the North Island Secondary Schools’ Championships regatta being cancelled because of the alert level changes, medals were awarded to those crews who placed in the top three crews for their respective islands. Lucy Pettit, Sara MacGillivray, Eva Colyer + Sophie Ryan) U-17 coxed eight (Natalie Kirke, Serena Bhindi, Charlie Barclay, Natalie Spillane, Jasmine Ireland, Sara MacGillivray, Eva Colyer, Lucy Pettit + Sophie Ryan)

North Islands silver medal:

U-18 novice coxed eight (Holly RyanSalter, Issie Clayton, Eva Pritchard, Imogen Worrall, Kara Lorch-Church, Alexandra Fletcher, Eva Cope, Jemima Dryden + Bo Alpe) U-18 coxed quad (Imogen Foley, Ella Ross, Katie Ryan, Eva Colyer + Lauren Williams) U-18 coxed eight (Charlie Barclay, Serena Bhindi, Natalie Kirke, Ella Ross, Katie Ryan, Gretta Wiseman, Jasmine Ireland, Imogen Foley + Lauren Williams)

North Islands bronze medal:

U-17 coxed four (Charlie Barclay, Ella Ross, Jasmine Ireland, Serena Bhindi + Sophie Ryan) U-15 coxed octuple (Emily Cosham, Alexandra Fletcher, Imogen Worrall, Eva Pritchard, Ava Dixon, Sammie Barclay, Joy Wang, Issie Clayton + Stella Brawn) U-18 novice coxed quad (Imogen Worrall, Alexandra Fletcher, Issie Clayton, Holly Ryan-Salter + Poppy Pett)

Congratulations to Charlie Barclay, Ella Ross and Sophie Ryan on their selection into the North Island U-18 rowing team! Along with Serena Bhindi, Jasmine Ireland and Natalie Kirke, they trialled for the North Island team over three days in the holidays. Following a training camp, Charlie, Ella and Sophie were selected to compete against the South Island U-18 team. They all achieved second places in their races against some strong South Island crews. Well done! Senior coxswain Lauren Williams was also named to cox the NZ U-19 Mens’ Eight. We believe Lauren is the first Diocesan coxswain to achieve national representative honours. Congratulations!