College Sport Media Photos of the Week for 30 January

College Sport Media wishes everyone a happy New Year. The 2017 school year might be just starting but there are plenty of talented and dedicated athletes and sportspeople competing and training hard around the country. Here’s a recent selection of below.

Want to contribute to College Sport Media’s Photos of the Week? We’d love to hear from you and publish your photos. Drop us a message on https://www.facebook.com/collegesportmedia or email us at [email protected] Note: If photos are not taken or by you we need to know their source so we can credit the photographer that took them or the publication where they were first posted.

1. A final set tiebreak is all that stood between 17-year old New Zealander Finn Reynolds and an Australian Open junior boy's doubles title in Melbourne recently. Finn, from Hawke's Bay, and Portugal's Durate Vale, lost the decider to fourth seeds Yu Hsiou Hsu (Chinese Taipei) and Lingxi Zhao (China) on Friday after it was tied one set apiece. Finn and Durante, an unseeded pairing teaming up for the first time, started the final well by taking the first set 10-8 in a tiebreak. Their opponents hit back to win the second set 6-4 which forced the match to a first-to-10 tiebreak to decide the winner. Hsu and Zhao won that 10-5 to take the match. Photo credit: Jack Thomas/Getty Image and follow the article link at http://www.stuff.co.nz/sport/tennis/88855684/new-zealander-finn-reynolds-loses-australian-open-junior-doubles-final-in-tiebreak

2. Keeping cool while everyone else was losing it proved to be a winning tactic for Te Puke's Tyler Steiner at the weekend. The 17-year-old won the MX2 (250cc) class on an extremely muddy second day of racing at the annual King of the Mountain motocross in Taranaki last Sunday, taking his Kawasaki KX250F to the front from the start and staying out of trouble to claim victory. Racing conditions were close to perfect for the junior racing on Saturday, but when a "weather bomb" exploded over the Barrett Road motocross track on the outskirts of New Plymouth overnight, organisers were forced to rethink Sunday's race programme. Photo credit: Photo: Andy McGechan, BikesportNZ.com and follow the article link at http://www.sunlive.co.nz/news/145636-te-puke-teen-scores-muddy-win.html#sthash.4YFP43R8.dpuf

3. Life can be challenging for teenagers as they juggle their sporting pursuits with their social life and the occasional concert. For Napier Girls’ High School year 13 student Hana-tia Ross who competes in four sports, waka ama, kayaking, surf lifesaving and canoe polo, at national level it can be particularly tough. But last week she had the balance spot on ... in and out of her waka. "I was heading to Raglan for the three-day Soundsplash Festival from Friday to Sunday when I thought I would call into to the national waka ama champs at Lake Karapiro to support Mum. Then I learnt my under-23 W1 500m event was on the Thursday before the concert ... with three wins from as many races, the heat, semifinal and final I won the title," the 17-year-old recalled. Photo credit: Paul Tayor and follow the article link at http://www.nzherald.co.nz/hawkes-bay-today/news/article.cfm?c_id=1503462&objectid=11787997

4. For many, the start of the new school year means the secondary school rowing season moving into full swing. The weekend just gone saw the annual Cambridge Town Cup at Lake Karapiro involving 1662 rowers from around the North Island. This year’s Maadi Cup is at Karapiro from 27 March – 2 April.  Photo credit and to view the full gallery: Rowing Celebration - https://www.facebook.com/pg/RowingCelebration/photos/?tab=album&album_id=1242352769151360  View the results of the regatta at http://www.rowit.co.nz/results/kric2017r2

5. Hannah O’Connor of Sacred Heart College, New Plymouth, leads a field of current and recent secondary school athletes around the first bend of the recent Women’s U20 1500m race the Capital Classic athletics meet at Wellington’s Newtown Park. She pulled away to win this race comfortably in 4.28.85, ahead of Charli Miller (St Peter’s, Cambridge) in 4.39.40, Kelsey Forman (Wellington High School) in 4.40.54 and Tessa Webb (Feilding High School) in 4.42.39.  On Saturday in Inglewood, Hannah sliced nearly three seconds of her PB in the 800m with a run of 2:17.33 There’s plenty of athletics coming up, with this year’s NZ Athletics Championships in March in Hamilton.

6. Straight out of Feilding High School, Vilimoni Koroi made his international debut for the All Black Sevens in Wellington over the weekend and looks set to play in Sydney this coming weekend. Photo credit: Mike Lewis Pictures https://www.facebook.com/Mike-Lewis-Pictures-323353771157586/