Norfolk Island Central School Athletics Carnival 2023

We all know when a Norfolk Island Central School (NICS) sports carnival is approaching. Be it late Tuesday evening or crazily early on a Wednesday morning, the characteristic red, green and blue decorations start to appear all over Norfolk. This year we were incredibly lucky to have been able to proceed with our annual athletics carnival despite the weather situation. On Wednesday morning many students eagerly awaited the 7am Norfolk Radio announcements, to hear confirmation as to whether our carnival would proceed, or to find out that all our handmade recycled and reusable decorations had gone up prematurely. Luckily for us this year the weather clear, beautiful, sunny and warm, resulting in a picture perfect day.

As students at NICS we have always been encouraged to dress in our house colours and bedazzle our uniforms with hair spray, face paint, zinc and ribbons. The playground banter flows through the school community throughout the entire week, and we all favour our own houses. However when it comes to carnival day most of us can be seen with splashes of all three houses colours. The athletics carnival brings many memories for all, a first experience for our kindy kids, and a last experience for us in year 12.

Participation from all NICS students was high this year and as much as talent counts towards the day, the effort everyone contributes builds to the unique atmosphere. It is amazing to watch our students compete in each of their track and field events, as well as the house relays at the end of the day. Multiple records were broken during the pre-carnival day events as well as on Wednesday. With a big congratulations to Donte Christian, who is the 2023 winner of the prestigious Kindy Cup!

NICS athletics carnival is uniquely characterised by our two last events of the day, the ‘hamstring cup’ and the house marching competition. Thank you to all ex-NICS students for representing their houses in this greatly anticipated event and congratulations to Norfolk House for dominated all sporting carnivals this year, successfully taking out a tri-factor winning, as well as the marching competition at the athletics carnival.

Thank you and congratulations to our wonderful house captains for making the Athletics Carnival such a great event. Many thanks to all the staff and

volunteers who made the carnival run so smoothly.

A special thankyou to the Athletics Club for marking the field and lending equipment, Tim Rogers for being the starter and Brentt Jones for his assistance with the field events. Thanks to Don Reynolds for the sound equipment, and the Hamstring Cup coordinators, Tanya Randall, Tara Morgan and Kari Judd.

Congratulations and thank you to all competitors and especially the house captains for their time, enthusiasm and effort, not only at this carnival but for the entire year.