About 100 of our wahine toa were due to have spent the last week competing in South Island and National tournaments as part of School Sport NZ Winter Tournament Week (WTW). To say the cancellation of WTW has been a disappointment for the girls is an understatement - particularly those Year 13s who also missed out on their respective tournaments in 2020. But our girls are hanging in there and it has been great to see so many of them channelling their disappointment into staying connected with their teammates and peers during lockdown, getting involved in mini team challenges and virtual workouts provided by our coaching and sports staff. Thanks to our coaches, managers and staff who are supporting our students through this challenging time.

Check out some of the amazing stuff the sporting community has been up to:

A motivator for our teams to stay connected has also been the possibility of the winter sport season playing out in the coming weeks, should Alert Levels allow. This week we received an update from School Sport Canterbury about how this might happen – this is summarised below.

Return to Play & Tournaments

The following principles will shape the last few weeks of the winter season delivered by School Sport Canterbury (SSC) should alert levels allow:  

• Sport can only be played when we reach Alert Level Two and any rethinking / update of Level 2 Activity Guidelines have been satisfied. Sport NZ’s current guidelines can be found here Level 2 Activity Guidelines and will be updated for the Rangi community early next week depending on any further layering that might happen to these guidelines at a national level.

• A week of return to play preparation will be given to schools. No SSC weekly competitions will resume before Monday 13th September, giving schools the week of 6th September to prepare teams and grounds for the completion of local competition.

• If Alert Levels remain stable,  SSC will look to conclude all winter competitions by Friday 17th September. This might mean playing straight finals or double headers.  

• If for any reason competitions cannot be completed by Wednesday 22nd September (at the very latest), no further fixtures will be arranged, thus bringing the season to a close. At this point competition winners will be declared based on table position at the conclusion of the regular season.

• All safety protocols must be understood, in place and adhered to.  No spectators will be permitted at School Sport Canterbury competitions under Level 2,  to ensure we stay under the gathering threshold.  

School Sport Canterbury (SSC) and School Sport NZ  (SSNZ) also provided some strong messaging this week as part of the cancellation of Winter Tournament Week that any National or South Island tournaments will not be rearranged. There has been much discussion between SSNZ and national sporting organisations around how the school sport calendar looks for the remainder of the year. The latest updates with the movement of NCEA exams is amended dates for NZSS Athletics and Touch events, to now be held as below:

NZSS Athletics Championships, Thursday 16 – Saturday 18 December, Inglewood, Taranaki

NZSS Touch Championships, Friday 17 – Sunday 19 December, Rotorua

Our convenors of touch and athletics will be in contact with coaches & students involved in the coming week to determine availability and appetite for attending.

A key discussion point has also been the request to support the SSNZ sanctioning process. Over the coming weeks you may hear of invitations to attend sporting events from unsanctioned organisers looking to fill the void created by the cancellation of WTW, potentially using the October holiday break and encroaching into the summer sport window. These pop-up competitions make the coordination of School Sport harder, and the development of any non-sanctioned tournament may not have been done with any consultation with schools and Principals.   Our position as a partner school and member of the SSC management committee, is that Rangi Ruru will not send teams to unsanctioned events. Additionally if events are created which are sanctioned by SSNZ, there is still no guarantee we would attend as we would need to consult with Senior Management and our community, before agreeing to be involved.

While it is with bated breath we await the move to Level 2 and hopefully the completion of the Winter sport season, our sports department have been looking ahead to Term 4, the return of longer days, warmer weather and summer sport. A link to summer sport signs ups has gone out this week to students in Years 9 to 13 (https://rrgs.nz/2021T4SportSignupsYr9-13), with a link for Year 7 and 8 to come early in the coming week. Lots of options on offer to be active for fun or competition in the summer term.

And to finish off, it only seems appropriate to share the 2021 version of the Rangi Ruru Lockdown Alphabet Circuit brought to you by Strength & Conditioning Coach, Ross Kennedy. Try it out with your whanau and enjoy.

Nga mihi nui

Mandy Anderson