Taranaki Athletics Champs

On the weekend of the 23rd of February we had Taranaki children’s athletic champs. On the first day I had 1500 metres. I warmed up for twenty minutes and then went to the marshalling tent. I was the only one for my age group in the race. I thought that there would have been more people competing. I still wanted to get a good time so I followed the thirteen year old in front of me. On the last lap my time was 4 minutes point 2. I went really fast on the last lap and my tome at the finish was 5 minutes point 2. I was really happy with that time. They took ages to present the medals and when the finally did I was the only one on the podium. I had my 400 metres later on. There were 7 people in the race. I had the 6th lane and was all ready to go. I was out in front as soon as the gun went off. I had a great start and got past the first hundred metres really fast. When I got to the last bend I really had to power it because most of my opponents had the inside lanes. By the time I was on the last straight I had won it. I was really happy with my performance. On the second and last day I had long jump it was in the morning. It was really wet and cold that day. We got to do our practice run up and jump. We were already soaked before we even started! My first jump was around 3 metres 50 which I had to really improve on before the next jump. The next jump was a no jump which I was pretty disappointed with. I jumped 3 metres 97 on my last jump and that was a bit better. I was sitting third and the last guy had to beat me to get third and he jumped 4 metres 10 and I got fourth. My next event was the 800 metres. There were 5 boys in it. I was in front from the gun again. After the first lap I was a bout 50 metres in front and I ran an extra fast second lap only to just about kill myself at the end. My time was good and I got gold. I had 200 metres next up. I drew lane 3 so I had to run an extra fast bend which I did and then I ran a really fast straight to end up finishing third behind Connor and a boy from Kaponga. I had discus next but the discus was slippery and it mostly went out. I finished up with three golds and one bronze medal. I also got selected for the Taranaki interprovincial team.

Connors Motor Bike

On the 9th February I went to Connors for the weekend. On Sunday it was raining hard so we got our wet weather gear on and went out to the motorbike shed because I had a great idea. I said to Connor
“The ground will be very slippery so it would be great for drifts”. Connor has a 100cc 2wd four wheeler with absolutely no grip on the tires. So when it rained you didn’t even have to use the handbrake. Connor had first turn and he did a 180! He was going really fast and then the bike turned and he did a massive drift and turned right around and went back the way he came from. When it was my turn I tried doing a donut. I put the bike in second gear and turned the wheel until I was going around in circles normally then I put the throttle right down and the back wheels spun out. I kept turning and before I knew it I was going around in circles with the wheels spinning and I was making a perfect mud circle. Then we tried a wheel spin. I drove the bike up to a loose part of gravel and revved the bike in neutral then I jammed it in first gear and the wheels spun like crazy. It worked! When we left the paddock there was heaps of drift marks and perfect circles. We thought that we would give it a try down the track where there were heaps of puddles and places where you could go really fast. I was first and went down the track full throttle and hit a massive puddle. Water went everywhere and I got soaked but we didn’t mind because we were having great fun. But after a while we thought that the paddock was more fun and went back to tear it up some more! We decided to put the motorbike away after a while because I spotted some oil on the ground and the motor was starting to get a bit hot.

Jet Boatin' on the Waikato River

When we went to Taupo on the second day of our holiday we went jet boating. When we got down to the river the driver told us his name and told us our seats in the jet boat. Then he told us the rules and sped off. The noise of the 25 cubic inch, 500 horsepower V8 was amazing; you could hear it from all the way down the river. We went up to the Aratiatia rapids and they had just let the dam go so there was only a little bit of water was coming out. The driver said that in a few minutes there would be thousands of gallons of water coming down here in a few minutes so it would be a great time to make an orderly retreat (the guy was a bit of a hard case!). Then the engine roared down the river until we came to a calm spot where we nearly hit the top speed of 80km/h! Then he spun his hand around and we did a 360 degree spin. Everyone got soaked! We carried on down the river, very nearly missing the bank. We came to some huge rapids and that was when he floored it over them. We hit the big wave and then became airborne. It was such a thrill. Then he turned around and went back up the huge rapids. The jet boat sounded like it was struggling but the driver said that it was because there was heaps of air in the rapids and the jet boat pumps air, not water so therefore it does not go fast up the rapids. Then we went back to the dock. It was a great ride.