Paul Roos Dominance

Paul Enthoven

Coming off the back of an incredibly successful pre-season water polo camp attended by the seasoned Hungarian coach Csaba Rull, and domination at PRG’s pre-season festival, our PRG 1st water polo team was on their way to the prestigious SAC Shield water polo tournament in Makhanda/Grahamstown hosted by St Andrew’s College (SAC). The PRG 1st water polo team had not won a significant tournament in 8 years, but with a promising team in 2023, that was all about to change.

The boys had a very early wake-up on the first day of the tournament to travel to Grahamstown where they were faced with their first of many challenging games. St John’s College posed a massive obstacle in the pool stages as they had completely dominated schoolboy water polo in South Africa for the past couple of years. However, our team was able to sweep through the first day with relative ease against St John’s College (10-7 victory), Michael House (13-7 victory) and, lastly, Clifton (9-5 victory).

The Friday games would determine the pool winners and the 1st team continued to dominate. Our first game that day against Bishops ended convincingly in PRG’s favour with a 12-6 victory. The Last game of the day was played against the hosting school, St Andrew’s College, which had a massive crowd behind them, but PRG managed to push through the noise and taunts to defeat SAC in dominating fashion – winning 10-2. The playoffs had arrived and PRG were set to play the deceivingly good Westville side who had beaten Rondebosch (the number one seeded team in the other pool). Our first team managed to pull away in the final minutes of the game to come out victorious with a final score of 5-4. Once again, they were faced with the heavily supported St Andrew’s side who came in firing with heaps of passion. However, our first team was able to smother the SAC side with their own fire and passion to squeeze out a narrow 6-4 victory – once again disappointing the home side. PRG entered the finals as underdogs, having lost to a similar Rondebosch side in 2022’s Mazinter finals. After an arduous three quar- ters, our boys headed into the last chukka down 3-2. Showing amazing grit and determination our boys were able to come back and win the momentous game with a score of 5-4.

Josh Reyneke, the first team captain, lifted the SAC Shield in victory for the first time in the school’s history – signifying the results of a complex water polo programme that has been developed by the accomplished First team coach Vaughn Marlow over his many years at the school.

This win was more than just PRG’s first major tournament victory in eight years, but also an indication of the water polo that our teams will come to play in the coming years and the potential excellence that awaits our water polo programme.

Daar was groot ongelukkigheid verlede jaar toe die wind letterlik die 2022-XCO teen 78 km/h weggewaai het en alle wedrenne om die nippertjie gekanselleer moes word. Mnr. Puddu vertel hoe alles perfek en gereed was vir die Saterdag, maar dat die wind só gewaai het dat 21 gazebo’s flenters gewaai is. Ons sou toe nooit kon raai hoe perfek 2023 se verrigtinge sou verloop nie. Mnr. Puddu het verwag dat internasionale ryers sal inskryf, maar nie dat soveel van die wêreld se bestes — selfs wêreldkampioene — sou inskryf nie!

Internasionale XCO-bergfietsryers van 17 lande is na Stellenbosch gelok om een van die moeilikste bane in Suid-Afrika aan te durf. Groot name soos Nino Schurter, Alan Hatherly, Fillopo Colombo, Victor Koretzky, Alessandra Keller en Kate Courtney was daar en het gesorg vir groot groepe ondersteuners.

Mnr. Puddu en sy span het hard ge-

Die baan het kenmerkende sektore gebied, naamlik Varsity Drop Off, Rock Garden, Wine barrel en Pick-up Sticks ens. Die baan is tegnies en ryers moes hul storie ken en met moeë lywe hard konsentreer om op hul fietse te bly. Daar is verskeie kere grond gekoop en sommiges het ongelukkig seerder as ander gekry.

Vir elke Paul Roos-bergfietsryer was dit ’n naweek om te onthou. Om jou skool te verteenwoordig by ’n geleentheid wat in jou agterplaas aangebied word, om op dieselfde grond as jou grootste helde te ry en deur al die bloed en sweet dit net absoluut te geniet, is ’n voorreg. Ons is dankbaar dat ons deel van ’n wêreldklas-kompetisie kon wees en ons bedank graag vir mnr. Ben Puddu, tannie Adele de Villiers, Marc Fourie en die res van die Paul Roos MTB-gemeenskap wat hierdie spogbyeenkoms moontlik gemaak het.