The muddier the better at annual tough kids challenge
The only competition to be found at the annual tough kids challenge this year was which kid could get the muddiest. The winners were all 660 of them.
Mount Biggs School on the outskirts of Feilding were happy to be hosting a hoard of year 3 to 8 kids from 13 different schools.
The day was about kids challenging themselves to do their best rather than compete with their peers. Every participant was awarded a medal.
It involved one huge obstacle course full of various physical and fine motor skills challenges.
Challenges included running across fields and through tyres, down steep hills, beam walks and wading though a mud pool. During this, they also faced a nut and bolt screw challenge, a lemon suck and a bean bag toss.
All year groups completed the same course with the support of volunteers from hakea Air Base and Feilding High School’s ambassador programme.
And, although it wasn’t a competition, there was certainly pride to be found for whoever could get the muddiest.
Mount Biggs School pupil Cooper Kieghey, 11, tackled the mud pool head-first. He and Bella Scanlan, 11, agreed that the waterslide into the mud was the best part.
Sienna Hosking, 12, said the obstacle course was tough but really fun, and like many other older kids had done it in previous years. Libby Priest, 12, had a slight advantage over her peers. Her family owned the farm the course was on.
She admitted she’d snuck in a few training sessions before the big day, but made up for it by personally ensuring the mud was especially muddy for her schoolmates.
After a hose down and lunch, pupils returned to the course to redo the challenge in teams. Again, the goal was to be the team that got the muddiest.
Mount Briggs School principal Tony West said one of the best parts about the event was watching it break down the barriers of kids who were usually ‘‘too cool for stuff’’. Olivia Scanlan was one of the organisers, and said it took the entire year between events to organise sponsors and logistics. The event typically took place in November, however last year’s event was cancelled due to Covid-19 concerns. ‘‘We couldn’t do it without comO¯munity support,’’ said Scanlan. ‘‘It’s a big deal.’’
Hundreds of children splashed, crashed, leapt, slid and crawled their way through a fantastically filthy obstacle course at Mt Biggs School yesterday. Photographerwarwick Smith was there.