Our 2022 tennis season had a bumpy start due to the COVID-19 restrictions in Term 1. Disappointingly, our HBHS Tennis Championships, the Waikato Interschool, the Senior Quad, the New Plymouth Exchange and the National Secondary Schools Competitions did not go ahead.

However, our Super 8 team of Jack McGregor, Hamish Kerr, Ben Stephens, Flynn McGregor, and Oliver Taylor travelled to Napier and placed third. HBHS won against Palmerston North Boys' High School and Napier Boys' High School but lost to Tauranga Boys’ College and narrowly lost to New Plymouth Boys’ High School (tied for matches but lost on countback of games won).

The Waikato Secondary Schools Tennis Championships were deferred to late in Term 1 with separate days for singles and doubles (so that numbers on any day could be restricted to less than 100). HBHS was placed first overall boys’ school for both singles and doubles. We won the Junior, Intermediate and Senior grades in both singles and doubles. In our Intermediate and Senior grades our players were consistently the top four players in each grade. The results were:

Singles - Junior:

🥇 Flynn Vinnicombe

Singles - Intermediate:

🥇 Flynn McGregor

🥈 Thando Thebe

🥉 Jeremy Coombe

4th: Andy Nguyen

Singles - Senior:

🥇 Jack McGregor

🥈 Oliver Taylor

🥉 Hamish Kerr

4th: Jacob Kilgour

Doubles - Juniors:

🥇 Flynn Vinnicombe (Year 9) and Steven Lin (Year 9)

Doubles - Intermediate:

🥇 Flynn McGregor (Year 11) and Thando Thebe (Year 10)

🥈 Jeremy Coombe (Year 11) and Andy Nguyen Year 11)

Doubles - Senior:

🥇 Jack McGregor (Year 12) and Oliver Taylor (Year 11)

🥈 Hamish Kerr (Year 13) and Jacob Kilgour (Year 12)

Social Tennis continues to be popular in Terms 1 and 4 with 20-30 students participating. In place of the Waikato Interschool Competition we organised our own handicap competition ladder in Term 1. Well done to Tobias Wetzels who won the most games.

A big thank you to all the teachers who help on and off the court, especially to Mr Alby Ellis for taking the Super 8 team to Napier, and Ms Debbie Morrow for her organisation of and dedication to social tennis. Thank you also to Mrs Anel Botha and Mr Errol Mallinson, and to Pete Hoyland and his team of coaches for their invaluable input to our squad programme.

We look forward to resuming our usual competition load in 2023 with current and new students participating.

Melissa Young

Teacher In Charge of Tennis