Hamilton Girls’ High School in medal hunt

Hamilton Girls’ High School are going into Maadi buoyed by a gold and silver at the North Island secondary school champs.

Leah Scott and Brook Baldwin won gold in the U17 double sculls at regatta earlier this month, while Jaimie Wilson and Charlotte Whitham won silver in the U16 double sculls.

Head coach Scott Wilson said it was an exciting day for them. “After what we did, there’s a certain self-belief.”

They’re looking to repeat their performance at next week’s Maadi Cup at Lake Karapiro. Wilson says he’s hoping that they contest four or five A-Finals at Maadi, but it will depend on how the girls are set in their minds.

“We’re still working them hard so hopefully they peak again at Maadi.”

His biggest advice for the girls is to trust their training.

His daughter Jaimie Wilson is among the rowers he coaches. “It was pretty cool on the Dad front,” Scott said of his daughter’s silver win.

He started as an interested parent when Jaimie took up rowing aged 13, and that led to his coaching involvement. This year he took over as head coach.

They are like each other’s family, Wilson says of his daughter and the other 13 rowers and three coxswains.

“I started as a coach and ended up inheriting 16 surrogate daughters.”

“They go from being these rowing girls to becoming these really strong women. All the stuff that we try to teach them in rowing, it’s stuff that’ll carry through to the way they approach life after school as well.”

See related story about Hamilton Girls’ High School here