MAGS students doing well in track and field

Is there something in the water at Mount Albert Grammar School making their athletes run faster,
jump farther and throw further? 

Eleven new school records were set at MAGS’ Athletics Day in February.  Among the record-breakers were three Year 13 students. Symone Tafuna'i set new times for both the Senior Girls’ 100m and 200m, Niven Longopoa broke the 110m hurdles and the long jump records in the Senior Boys’ grade and Rebekah Van Dort strode out in the Senior Girls’ long distance events to break her own 800m, 1500m and 3000m records that she set last year. 

All three have busy schedules outside the classroom.

Symone has been in Wellington this weekend where, at a wet and windy Newtown Park track, she finished third in both the Youth Women 100m and 200m. Symone heads to Australia this week to compete in the Australian Junior Athletics Championships at Sydney Olympic Park as part of the Athletics New Zealand Performance Potential Squad, in a bid to make the New Zealand team for the World Youth Games in July.


“The World Youth Games are in Columbia and it’s my goal to make the New Zealand team,” Symone said. “I’ve been training for that for quite a while to try and qualify.

“My personal best (PB) for the 100m is 12.11 and for the 200m it’s 24.74 - that’s fast but “not as fast as I want it to be,” she quickly pointed out.

“It’s real close but also real frustrating - for me to qualify for the Worlds I need to get 12 seconds for
the 100m and 24.40 for the 200m.”

Symone has a family background in Athletics “My parents both did athletics when they were young and when my sister started I followed her into it. It was just a fun thing when I first got involved but I started getting serious when I was in Year 10.”

“I used to play other sports as well, but I gave them all up just to focus on Athletics.”

Her trip across the Tasman this week for the Australian Junior Nationals will be her second  successive year competing there. “I competed there last year in the relay team and the 100m. I came fourth and was 0.30 from third – I was so close.”

Symone and Niven competed with distinction in the New Zealand Secondary Schools National Athletic Championship in Wanganui last December as Year 12s. Symone finished second in both the Senior Girls’ 100m and 200m, while Niven finished second in the Senior Boys’ long jump and fourth in the Senior Boys’ 110m hurdles.

Niven, who also plays rugby for the MAGS first XV as a wing/fullback, is coming back from an injury-interrupted 2014

“I was injured early last year playing rugby and I had to have a shoulder reconstruction. I was only
able to play sport again two months before the Athletics Nationals in December and my shoulder
still wasn’t right then.”

He said it’s much better now. “I jumped over seven metres last week.”

Niven’s recent leap of 7.04m broke an 18-year MAGS Senior Boys’ Long jump record of 6.65m.  He
finished second at the Nationals in Wanganui with a jump of 6.79m, behind winner Hamish Gill of
Westlake Boys’ High School who won with 7.09m.  

His fourth place finish at the 110m hurdles in Wanganui was in a time of 15.23, behind winner Peter Cox of Otago Boys’ High School who ran 13.89.  His recent record time to break the MAGS school  record was 14.74.

Niven didn’t go to Wellington this weekend with Symone as he was playing in a Blues Super Rugby organised pre-season rugby 10s tournament.

He said goal after finishing school this year is to try to win a sporting scholarship somewhere, but for
now he’s just enjoying being injury free and eyeing up a big year.

The third of this trio, Rebekah, said that she only took up running, largely by chance, to keep fit for
football.

Last year Rebekah was centre back for the MAGS Girls First XI that won the NZSS Football Championships for the second consecutive year row last season. This team won every game, scoring 114 goals and, with Rebekah helping to defend the net, they didn’t concede a single goal.

She also does cross country in the winter – though not as seriously – and plays futsal for MAGS who are competing in the New Zealand Secondary School Futsal Championships in Wellington on 26 and 27 March.

“I started out in athletics at the start of last year just to see how it would go; I just thought it would be a fun way to help prepare for the football season. I run the 800m, 1500m and 3000m events and it’s a really good way to stay competitive.”

She didn’t attend the Nationals in December, but her school record times at the recent MAGS Athletics Day were 2:28.56 in the Senior Girls’ 800m (she ran 2:30.29 in 2014) 5:15.16 in the Senior Girls’

1500m (she ran 5:18.82 in 2014) and 11:36.0 in the Senior Girls’ 3000m (she ran 11:45.06 in 2014).

The other 2015 MAGS Athletics Day record breakers were Kalisi Longopoa (Junior Girls’ 70m Hurdles – Niven’s sister), Paige Witehira (Intermediate Girls’ Javelin – breaking a record set by current Black Ferns rugby player Portia Woodman in 2007), Sharne Robati (Junior Girls’ Shot Put), and Dylan Moon (Junior Boys’ Triple Jump – breaking a record set in 1978).

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