The AUT Millennium National Aquatic Centre hosted 300 students for the annual Westlake Girls Swimming Sports last week. Featuring a mixture of Championship competitiveness and fun House events, students played their part in accumulating as many House points they could to win the overall Swimming House Trophy.

In the racing pool, the school’s silver medal winning national team took turns in winning the various disciplines with 2022 Sportswoman of the Year, Zoe Crawford dominating the freestyle races, Lena Hamblyn-Ough owning the breaststroke and Savannah Eve Martin claiming both butterfly and backstroke.  However, Crawford came back to win the 100m Individual Medley which consists of all four.

In the Intermediate grade, Year 11 student Kaira Wohlfarth, went swimmingly well to win every discipline on the day and the tussle between Year 9 students between Brooke Humphries and Eva-Makarova Paton kept the overall Junior Champion Award alive but the honours eventually went to Humphries.

On a more colourful note, student creativity was vibrant in the Synchronised Swimming, Manu (bombing) and Inflatable relay events. The day long displays of passionate, entertaining, and unexpected athleticism resulted in the Red House, Onewa, winning the overall House Trophy for the first time in many years, followed by Akoranga and then Wairu. Can they make it their year by winning Athletics Day too?

A notable performance came from the Staff Synchronised Swimming Team of Renae Dodds, Ashley Mckenzie, Gail Pocock and Holly Pearson, who outshone the student winners from Wairau with their dynamic turns and masterful grace before adding the Premier hockey coach, Will Lacey, to their ranks and impressing in the team’s relay against the students.

Swimming Champions:

Junior Champion

1^st – Brooke Humphries – Wairau, 2^nd – Eva Makarova-Paton – Onewa, 3^rd – Tannah Strombeck – Hauraki

Intermediate Champion

1^st – Kaira Wohlfarth – Akoranga, 2^nd – Annebel van Wyk – Onewa, 3^rd – Cayleigh Blackburn – Pupuke

Senior Champion

1^st – Zoe Crawford – Hauraki, 2^nd – Lena Hamblyn- Ough – Wairau, 3^rd – Savannah-Eve Martin – Onewa

House Championship

1^st – Onewa – 173, 2^nd – Akoranga -142, 3^rd – Wairau – 133, 4^th – Hauraki – 129, 5^th – Pupuke – 83