Remembering the best sporting moments of past 12 months
the America’s Cup in June. Basically Team New Zealand helmsman Peter Burling had tied Jimmy Spittle on Oracle in a knot, to the point the little Aussie battler and his $10 million boat were virtually becalmed. As Burling and the Kiwi boat came cruising past, Burling glanced across and caught the eye of his mouthy rival. Burling waved, and, as every Kiwi farmer driving his ute on a dusty back road does, flicked a casual index finger. For a couple of seconds Fred Dagg, Clarke’s brilliant invention from the 1970s, was at the helm of a hitech AC72, and if you looked closely, he had a wee smile on his lips, and a cheeky glint in his eye. of a Pasifika hotbed, became the centre of the Tongan, and the New Zealand, sporting universe.
The Tongan league team, inspired by Jason Taumalolo, beat Samoa and then beat the Kiwis. (In the semifinal in Auckland they went within a gasp, and a refereeing call, of beating England.) But the players weren’t even the stars of the show. The capacity crowds at Waikato Stadium were. They were in a state of good natured, near hysteria for every minute of every game.
While arrests in Auckland got all the publicity, let’s remember what Waikato police district commander Bruce Bird said after the TongaSamoa game: ‘‘Many of them [in the crowd] have travelled down from Auckland and it’s been absolutely fantastic, an absolute pleasure to have them here.’’ The women’s sevens team outshone the men with a silver in Rio, but the best was still to come. It wasn’t just that the Black Ferns beat England 41-32 in the World Cup final in Belfast in August, it was the way they played all tournament, with speed, skill, daring, and hearts as big as houses.
It was exhilarating to watch, and while it’s a sad reality these Black Ferns may not reap fair rewards during their careers, they’ve made it impossible for women’s rugby to ever be consigned to the back of the plane again.
Virtue can be rewarded
Tom Walsh won the world shot put title in August, joining Valerie Adams, who’s won four world titles, at the top of the throwing world. Remarkable for a small country? Yes, but even more remarkable is that in New Zealand our throwers are clean.
A couple of weeks ago Adams, training again two months after the birth of her first child, Kimoana, had just put her daughter down after a dawn feed when there was a knock on the door. Drug testers here never turn a blind eye, and, apparently, they never sleep either.
The kid from Palmy takes the wheel
New Zealand’s first world Formula One champion, Te Puke’s Denny Hulme, was so unfazed by the big time in the 1960s that Aussie world champion Jack Brabham had to tell him the English officials were a bit offended that Hulme was driving his practice laps for the British Grand Prix at Silverstone in bare feet.
Brendon Hartley, born and raised in Palmerston North, was nudging at a Formula One drive when he was just 18. So, despite a string of mechanical problems, it’s perhaps no wonder that as a 28-year-old he took to the Grand Prix circuit as calmly as if he was taking mates for a night spin down Himatangi Beach. And his 100 per cent pure Kiwi reaction to obtaining a fulltime F1 drive in 2018? ‘‘It’s very satisfying.’’
Rieko Ioane
Just that. Already the best rugby wing in the world at 20 he can become one of our all time greats. ‘‘He’s phenomenal,’’ said Steve Hansen, which for a man as laconic as the All Blacks coach is the equivalent of him doing cartwheels the length of Manchester Street.
Happy New Year.