On the morning of the 29 August, many of our students, teachers, and whānau set out to various destinations around Aotearoa to participate in Winter Tournament Week. We had great results across all codes, with a fantastic effort from everyone.

I competed with the TGC 2nd XI Hockey team at the Tier 4 Upper North Island Secondary School competition in Whakatāne. The tournament was held over five days and the competition was fierce.

From the moment we set foot in Whakatāne it was all go. Our first game was against Northcote and we came away with a 3-1 win. We were all stoked with this result, and we were off to a good start. We had another game that day against Pinehurst who beat us by one. Pinehurst happened to be staying at the same holiday park as us, they greeted us with kind smiles and invited us to play a game of volleyball with them. We all enjoyed ourselves and had lots of laughs.

Our third game was against Trident. It was a competitive game, but we came away with another win!

On day four we played Massey for a place in the semi-finals, winning 1-0. We placed top of the table in our pool, and were over the moon with our results! The pressure was immense as we went into the final rounds; we were exhausted, but excited to have made it this far.

On the last day, we played two difficult and challenging games. The first game was against Mount Roskill playing for first and second, but unfortunately we lost - they were just too good! We didn't let this stop us. We were fired up and ready to win against Pinehurst for a bronze medal. We scored during the first half of the game, and sideline anticipation grew as we fought for the ball, but Pinehurst scored in the last two minutes. We were tied and this led to a shootout. We won the shootout, which put us in third place overall in our tier! For this, we were awarded bronze medals at prize giving.

The whole experience was awesome, not just the games but the team bonding and time spent together with my peers. It was a tough week filled with highs and lows, but we all had lots of fun. It was a memorable experience!

A huge congratulations to all of the teams who competed across the country in Winter Tournament Week, and a big thanks to our coaches, teachers, and whānau who supported this event and made it all possible!