Olympic fever comes to WITT

From swimming and track to skateboarding and gymnastics, WITT’s Olympic FanZone has kept students and staff up to date with Kiwis over in Toyko for the 2020 Olympic Games.

The Olympic FanZone has been set up on the mezzanine floor of Te Kāuta Café playing full coverage of the Toyko 2020 Olympics. The highlight of the FanZone is undoubtedly the huge 5 x 3m screen, which added a cinematic experience to watching the Games.

Kaiāwhina (Student Helper) Katie Burns said the FanZone was a great addition to O-Week.

It’s a really good thing to welcome new students,” she said.

“It’s fantastic having the big screen to watch the Olympics. I’ve really enjoyed watching the kayaking after a hard day’s work, it’s nice watching someone else do the work.”

The Olympic FanZone has given students and staff a chance to stay up to date with the action in Toyko and get behind our Sports Academy Ambassador Lukka Jones, who represented New Zealand Canoe Slalom in both the K1 and C1 women's events.

Crowds also gathered to cheer on friend of WITT and swimmer Zac Reid. A key part of Zac’s training for Tokyo included land-based workouts in WITT’s new gym, Fitness Factory, as well as testing through our Sport Performance Centre on site.

With Olympic fever still running high around campus this week, students have a chance to compete in our very own WITT ‘Olympics’ events, vying for their place on the podium as well as medals and prizes.  

The WITT Olympics runs from Monday to Thursday this week, with trying their hand in a range of not-so-Olympic activities from mini-putt golf, rowing, cornhole and ring toss.  

Promotions and Recruitment Coordinator Olivia Conley said it was great to see students get so involved and having a bit of fun while competing with each other.

“There was one millisecond separating our gold and sliver medallist in the rowing competition,” She said.

While the Toyko 2020 Olympics comes to a close for another year the FanZone will only be taking a short break and set up again during the Paralympics beginning on 24 August.