Sports

Lucie Johnstona National Champion

Lucie Johnston (Year 6) recently competed in the Australian National Mountain Bike Championships where she rode hard and became the National Under 13 Girls Champion for XCC (short course) and the XCO (long course). Here is her story: 

I went to Maydena on the 11th and 12th of March to compete in the Australian National Mountain Bike Championships. I rode in the Cross Country short-course (XCC) race on the 11th. XCC is 15 mins trying to do as many short laps as possible. The track was in good condition. I was quite relaxed as I do lots of riding with my family and Friends' MTB club. I also race regularly in the Hobart Wheelers Dirt Devils club’s XC, Gravity Enduro and CycloCross series. But sadly, no other girls entered. 

The gun went and the start was fast. After a few laps, I was near the back but finding my rhythm after getting to know the track. Then I started overtaking some of the boys. After the race, I felt excited, happy, and confident for the next day.

After a good night’s sleep at home, I came back to Maydena to race in the Cross Country Olympic (XCO). This is a longer race where everyone in the U13s completed 3 long laps. My brother Ollie raced first in the U17 boys, so I watched and relaxed with my Dad. 

Soon I got ready for my race with a few warm-up rolls and sprints. In my race, there was again no girls, so I concentrated on racing the boys. I didn’t mind this. It was a fast start. Everyone wants to be at the front as there are not many overtaking spots on the narrow single track. I was in too easy a gear at the start and lost a few spots to the boys. But soon I was in full swing, pedalling fast and working on catching the boy in front. At the end, I sprinted my hardest. I was happy my family could watch including my grandparents. 

On the podium I was very, very proud to be the National Under 13 girls champion for XCC and XCO, I was beaming with pride. 

XC riding and racing is a great sport combining bike skills, fitness and fun. I recommend it to everyone! 

Hockey

A strong number of Friends’ students represented Tasmania at the National Hockey Championships in Launceston (U18’s) and Bathurst, NSW (U15’s):

Under 18: Maeve Bylsma, Isabelle Kruimink, Emily Rockerfeller, Felicity Wilson-Haffenden, and Oliver Pritchard.

Under 15: Rosie Fish, Wilhelmina Fish, Anika Jolley, Sophie Kruimink, Stella Pritchard, Emily Rawson, Wavey van Dorsselaer, Maddy Windsor, Angus McMullen and Charlie Rockefeller.

Congratulations to the U15 boys who won Silver at the Nationals!  A great result.  Final results can be viewed on the Hockey Australia website.  Well done to all the teams, players and support crew.

Rowing - A strong season

Since September last year, our rowers have been working hard together as a team and rowing community. With the success of three Aggregate Trophies at the Tasmanian Schools regatta, our rowers then embarked on The Head of the River regatta.

At the Head of the River, all the community worked hard and put in amazing performances at Lake Barrington over the weekend. In sometimes challenging conditions, our rowers showed great strength of character and spirit, working hard to support each other.

Full results from Head of the River are available here: https://tas.rowingmanager.com/regattas/5354

Our Open Boys & Girls represented the Friends' School at the 2021 National Championships, competing in the Under 19’s, School 8’s and School 4’s events. Both squads finished with strong performances in B Finals. 

There is a lot of emotion and energy that goes into a competition, be it a rowing season or any other sporting competition. For some this was the final event of their School rowing career - Thank you Ed & Charlotte for your Captaincy and our best wishes to our Year 12 rowers Kayla, Claudia, Cygnett, Iris, Tom D, Tom N, Archie, James. We are so very thankful to our leading coaches who have endured and committed to every inch of the journey with every rower - Tom Pilkington, Ian Jordan(Plank), Ian McMahon and Ron Gunn. Well done to every rower, coach and parent involved in the Friends' rowing season for all the amazing efforts on and off the water- it’s been an incredible effort.

There is a huge amount of work that goes on "behind the scenes" to make rowing at The Friends' School possible - thank you to all the Friends' Rowing community for their support and dedication throughout this excellent season.

Sailing

Term 1 saw a very successful inter-schools sailing roster involving 30 students. Friends’ entered 4 teams and it was pleasing to see many new students to the sport participate for the first time. This year Friends’ sailing welcomes Will Sargent as Head Coach and Rupert Hamilton as Assistant Coach to our sailing program. Both Will and Rupert are old scholars and have achieved great success for the school previously in sailing and are already sharing their knowledge with our younger and newer sailors. 

Congratulations to all our sailors who have been selected in one of three teams to represent the school at the Schools Team Sailing State Championships. This regatta will be held at Sandy Bay Sailing Club on the weekend of 24-25 April. As this is an outdoor event we encourage supporters to come down and cheer the teams on!

Soccer

Friends' Blue Year 9 Girls soccer team had a great season with fantastic attendance at training sessions led by student coaches Bridie Cooling and Charlotte Fischer. The parent manager was Roger Mulcahy and Kathy Baker was of great support for supervision at games.

The team played a great season and ended up in the final last night playing Fahan and played a competitive and well-defended game with a couple of close goal attempts but were narrowly beaten with a 1-0 final score.

Swimming

Congratulations to our 41 Morris students who participated in the JSSATIS Swimming Carnival at The Hobart Aquatic Centre today.

All members of the team swam beautifully and should be incredibly proud of their achievements from our youngest competitors in Year 3 up to our leaders in Year 6.

Fabulous team effort!!

Australian Age Swimming Championships

Congratulations to the following Friends’ students who competed at the Australian Age Swimming Championships on the Gold Coast over term break:

James Clues

Ella Chan

Kye Direen

Samuel Askey-Doran

Sophia MacDonald

Some amazing swims and State Records broken! Well done to all students and families involved.

Touch Football

Our Year 9/10 Girls' Touch Football team had a successful day at a Touch Football tournament in late March. The team won three games and lost one, coming second in the tournament, meaning they will be attending the State Finals on 29 April in Launceston.

Amazing work Team!