120+ participants boasted at Werohia Poitarawhiti Tournament

Sport Hawke’s Bay boasts 120+ participants at Werohia Poitarawhiti (Netball) Tournament

After starting with Sport Hawke’s Bay just two months ago, Māori Sports Educator Arama Ware has taken the bull by the horns by hosting a Werohia Poitarawhiti Tournament at Pettigrew.Green Arena on Sunday, October 1.

Within one week of announcing the tournament at the beginning of September, the social competition was at full capacity.

On Sunday, the event kicked-off at 9:00 a.m. and attracted over 120 whānau across 10 teams from 8 Marae in Kahungunu.

“This was an opportunity for whānau to participate as whānau representing their Marae in a kaupapa Māori context,” said Ware. “Werohia Poitarawhiti is something we’ve established to provide that for our people.”

Werohia Poitarawhiti is one initiative of MaraeFit – an annual inter-Marae competition where whānau are able to kōha points to their chosen marae by participating in a variety of physical activity events and workshops. The ultimate goal of this initiative is to provide opportunities for Māori to be active as a whānau under the banner of their Marae.

“It was great to see so many eager and talented Māori at the tournament all willing to support the kaupapa,” noted Ware. “With over 100 people participating in the tournament and approximately 120 people in attendance, the MaraeFit kaupapa has now reached more people and we look forward to seeing more of our whānau at MaraeFit events.”

“It was such a fun and exciting event for our friends and whānau to get into and keep our Māori generation active,” said Katrina Campbell of Korongata Marae. “We look forward to participating next year, next month, whenever you do things like this again.”

At the end of the day, Korongata Marae went head-to-head with Mangaroa Marae – both from Bridge Pa – in the final. The game ended with just one point between them (16-15) and Korongata coming out on top.

Participants were overheard saying Ko te toa o te rā ko te whakawhanaungatanga – The real winner of the day was coming together as whānau for one kaupapa.

ENDS

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