August 12, 5am
Gold for Ellesse Andrews in the women’s sprint, her second gold at the Paris Olympics.
The Cambridge-based Kiwi has claimed three medals – two golds and a silver – at Saint-Quentin-en-Yvelines Velodrome, west of Paris.
The Te Awamutu Sports Cycling Club alumna attended St Peter’s School Cambridge for the final two years of secondary school.
On Friday she won gold in the women’s keirin final. She, Rebecca Petch from Te Awamutu and Tauranga born Shaane Fulton made up the women’s cycling sprint team which picked up silver.
Ellesse Andrews, 2018
Cambridge-based Ally Wollaston was the final Kiwi in action in Paris when she took out bronze in the women’s omnium to go with her silver won with Bryony Botha, Emily Shearman and Nicole Shields in the women’s team pursuit.
She took up cycling at St Peter’s School in Cambridge and is a part-time Bachelor of Laws student at the University of Waikato.
See: Andrews claims title
Ally Wollaston
August 9, 3.40pm
Former Cambridge High School sailing team captain Micah Wilkinson, 28, – who attended St Peter’s Catholic School – and Erica Dawson, 30, from Albany in Auckland, have claimed bronze in the mixed multihull class at the Olympics sailing competition in Marseille.
Wilkinson – whose father Peter owns Wilkinson Transport Engineers in Cambridge – is a member of the Cambridge Yacht & Motor Boat Club and is also connected to Te Awamutu’s Ngā Roto Sailing Club. He was involved in go karting, rugby, and water polo at high school before switching his focus to sailing.
He first took up sailing as a six-year-old when his mother Linda Moorhead took him to a learn to sail programme on Lake Karāpiro
He told Sky Sport he and Dawson had raced together for five years and only medalled at one event.
“To do it when it matters is an incredible feeling.”
A former youth world champion in the 29er and a member of the 2017 Youth America’s Cup team, Wilkinson has plenty of experience and success in the Nacra 17. He switched from crewing to helming when joining forces with Dawson in 2019, breaking into the top 10 on the world rankings.
Micah Wilkinson.
Andrews wins gold
August 9, 7am
Cambridge-based cyclist Ellesse Andrews won gold in the women’s keirin final at the Paris Olympics today.
She now has a gold and two silvers at the Olympics – a silver in the women’s team sprint earlier in the week – and a silver in the keirin at the Tokyo games three years ago.
Ellesse Andrews being interviewed after her selection at the Velodrome in Cambridge. Photo: Steph Bell-Jenkins.
Earlier this morning the crew of Dame Lisa Carrington, Alicia Hoskin, Olivia Brett and Tara Vaughan won New Zealand’s first K4 canoe medal in 40 years.
New Zealand’s only other medal in the boat was in 1984 when Ian Ferguson, Paul MacDonald, Alan Thompson and Grant Bramwell won gold in Los Angeles.
Ellesse Andrews won the Emerging Talent award in 2018,
Dame Lisa Carrington with her spoils at Lake Karapiro. Photo: Mary Anne Gill
See: Andrews fills the gap, successfully
See: Velodrome celebrates fifth anniversary
August 8 8.45am
You can always rely on Waipā athletes to bring home Olympic medals.
Ally Wollaston, Bryony Botha, Emily Shearman and Nicole Shields have won silver medals after losing to the United States in the women’s team pursuit at the National Velodrome on the outskirts of Paris.
USA started strongly and the Kiwis were unable to peg them back. The Americans finished in 4:04.306 and New Zealand in 4:04.927.
Cambridge-based Wollaston took up cycling at St Peter’s School in Cambridge and is a part-time Bachelor of Laws student at the University of Waikato.
Shields moved to Hamilton from the South Island to study business at the University of Waikato seven years ago. She is part of the Sir Edmund Hillary programme and is doing bachelor of business.
Track endurance cyclist Nicole Shields with her parents, Lori Linney and Mike Shields. Photo: Steph Bell-Jenkins.
Ally Wollaston (St Peter’s) pedals her way into the lead in 2018.
7 August 3pm
It began last week with our rowing mums Brooke Francis and Lucy Spoors leading the way with gold.
The Cambridge-based rowers won the women’s double sculls at Vaires-sur-Marne Nautical Stadium, 20km east of Paris last Thursday and two days later Emma Twigg picked up silver in the single sculls.
See: Mums are in the same boat
New Zealand’s sprint cycling team for the Paris Olympic Games (from left) Rebecca Petch, Shaane Fulton and Ellesse Andrews with travelling reserve Olivia King. They are standing on the stage at the Velodrome where the team was announced against the official sponsors backdrop.
Then on Tuesday, Cambridge’s Ellesse Andrews, Rebecca Petch from Te Awamutu and Tauranga born Shaane Fulton made up the women’s cycling sprint team which picked up silver in the Saint-Quentin-en-Yvelines Velodrome in Paris.
Waipā had several other medal opportunities pending – in cycling, canoeing and on the track – when The News went to press.
Speaking to The News at the naming of the New Zealand Olympic rowing team at Lake Karapiro on June 4, as they were preparing to leave for France, Francis said there had been a lot of late nights since she had her daughter Keira in September 2022.
She had learned she could “operate at a very high level on not much sleep”.
Brooke Francis and her daughter Keira. Photo: Steph Bell-Jenkins
“I guess I’ve probably learnt that I’m capable of more than what I thought I was, prior to having a kid,” she said.
“I remember one day in particular when I had four hours and it was four hours’ broken, not even in a row, but I guess having Lucy in the double as well, who’s also got a kid, you know what each other’s going through.”
Spoors had her son, Rupert Robertson, in December 2022.
“Normally the team is selected in March, so I knew my run in to be selected was potentially going to be too tight, but I basically just started training when I felt like I could, and thought if I can get myself in a position to trial, then I will,” she said.
Francis said she and Spoors hadn’t actually missed many trainings because of their children, but it was nice having the full understanding and trust of a training partner in a similar situation.
“That time away from the kids is precious so we make the most of it and train really hard when we get those moments, because they can be few and far between,” she said.
Petch, who competed in BMX at the last Olympics in Japan, had been commuting regularly from her home in Pirongia, where she lives with husband Jarrod Browning, to train at the Velodrome in Cambridge.
Andrews moved with her family from Wanaka to Cambridge in 2016 attending St Peter’s School. She stayed on when her family moved back south.
“I do love living here,” she said.
“I have an awesome place and, you know, lots of friends, a great partner and I think all of those things really bring together that sense of community.”
Emma Twigg
Twigg won silver in the single sculls on Saturday behind Karolein Florijn of the Netherlands. She and wife Charlotte Twigg have a two-year-old son Tommy who was there to see his mum win a medal.
Twigg is a Cambridge-based marriage celebrant, cycle mechanic, holds a FIFA Master in Management, Law and Humanities of Sport degree, and is a Member of the New Zealand Order of Merit (MNZM).
Rebecca Petch
