There Are Good Things Happening Up North

Eyad drove to Kawakawa on Saturday to swim in the Bream Bay Club’s carnival. I couldn’t go because of a medical appointment at my North Shore clinic. I was disappointed. Swim meets in what you might call “rural New Zealand” are my favourites. The Counties Championships and the summer HBPB Championships in Gisborne create a wonderful atmosphere of competition and fun.

Lydiard and Jelley had the same view. Snell, Halberg and Magee ran in “out-of-the-way” places like Gisborne, Wairoa and Carterton. Walker and Quax used to turn a New Year meet in Tauranga into a world class competition. I believe one of Walker’s more significant early races was when he beat Quax in a Tauranga mile race.

It is important swimmers do not get ideas above their station. Mixing in with hundreds of pre-teens warming up before the Hawke’s Bay Champs was good for Toni Jeffs even when she was a Commonwealth and World Bronze medallist. Lydiard called the arrogance that comes with being good the “New Zealand disease”. Taking part in grass-roots swim meets is a wonderful antidote to contacting the “New Zealand disease”. Some of these meets might not have the world’s best starting blocks, the pools might be a bit shallow at one end, there might be no electronic timing and there may be a shortage of turn judges  But who cares. If your heads too big to race in the Wairoa Pool go do something else because you are not going to make it in swimming.

After-all consider these events. Snell broke his first world record on a short track in Wanganui. Alison ran her first Waikato Championships in Waharoa. The Waikato Times called her run a “surprise bronze medal”. Nichola Chellingworth broke a New Zealand Age Group record at a high school pool in Pahiatua and another at a Blenheim club night. Jane broke the New Zealand Open SC 200 metre breaststroke record in Waipukurau. Toni broke the New Zealand 50 metre freestyle record in Rotorua. She also had good swims in Blenheim, Gisborne and Whakatane. The really good are never too big to respect the grass roots.

The New Zealand disease is what I hate about the Swimming New Zealand (SNZ) culture Jan Cameron created and Gary Francis nurtures to this day. Remember when SNZ built stages at the National Championships for the centralised swimmers to sit, separate from and above, “normal” New Zealand swimmers. Remember when swimmers not in the SNZ centralised program were banned from New Zealand team meetings. Remember the money spent on dressing centralised swimmers in fake SNZ uniforms. SNZ did everything they could to encourage a culture of performance apartheid. Hundreds of New Zealand late developers were sacrificed on the altar of Jan Cameron’s ego.  Gary Francis is doing the same thing with his squad lists. They are elitist, bureaucratic rubbish, doing nothing but harm. We will never know the names of potential champion, late developers, who missed out on a Francis list and decided swimming was not for them. Instead they went to water polo, surf or sevens rugby.

And that’s why I encouraged Eyad to go to the Bream Bay meet – for the fun of it and the swimming benefit. Sure enough the meet had all the good things characteristic of these meets; all the good things characteristic of the best in New Zealand sport. All the good things scorned and debased by the Cotterills, Johns and Francis of this world.

Eyad was welcomed by genuine and sincere officials. The meet is in a lovely location and is well run. Best of all Eyad collected a much needed $70 for winning the Skins competition. Better than all that the standard of swimming in Northland is moving forward in leaps and bounds. Whangarei, Bream Bay and Bay of Islands are producing some genuinely competitive swimmers. The sport in Northland is a credit to the coaches and officials who have clearly created a winning environment.

However Eyad is worried about photographs taken at the pool. For example here is one taken at Bream Bay. The photograph shows all the swimmers who competed in the Skins event. As you study the photograph you should consider the deep meaning bombs and bombing have to a Syrian refugee. Eyad is in New Zealand largely because of the bombs and bombing of his home in Syria by Americans and Russians.

Now read the sign behind the swimmers.

It is good we can laugh at the double meaning. It says something special about New Zealand. It says everything about why Eyad is happy to call this place home. Thank you Bream Bay for a wonderful day and a well-run and enjoyable swim meet. See you next year.

Here are the results of Eyad’s swims.

Event Personal Best Time Bream  Bay Place
100 Medley 1.02.03 1.01.87 1st
50 Free 23.64 25.08 1st
100 Free 51.71 55.13 1st
Skins Bk 31.70 Bk 33.72 Fr 27.61 Fr 26.73 Br 32.22 1st

 

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