Tammy’s story goes back to 2016 with the establishment of Manawatu Triathlon Academy (MTA) which was designed to provide young, up and coming local triathletes the skill sets and capabilities to be the best.
Fast forward to 2022 when Tammy was selected to join HPSNZ’s Te Hāpaitanga cohort 2, an opportunity she describes as fantastic at a time when she needed a lot of personal as well as professional support.
“My experience through Te Hāpaitanga really whet my appetite for further development to a high performance level as both a coach and development leader in my favoured sport of triathlon,” says Tammy.
Now based in Taranaki, Tammy was accepted into the WiHPS Residency Experience programme in 2023 and has been working remotely as Triathlon NZ’s Women and Girls Lead, with three very clear objectives.
“A priority has been to increase the number of female participants in triathlon who want to progress as high performance athletes or move into coaching. So far, we’ve moved the dial on the number of 16–19-year-old junior athletes from 8 to 19 competing at the NZ championships and we now have nine women coaches in our sport.
“The second objective is to increase the level of performance to Brisbane 2032, a goal which is very much work in progress.”
The final objective is to increase awareness of what being a happy healthy athlete is about and why it is so important.
Tammy developed the TRINZ Healthy Female Athlete module which is accessible to the wider triathlon community – coaches, parents, supporters and athletes – to create as much awareness and impact as possible.
She also designed a system for accredited coaches where they receive a women’s module badge on their online coach profile so female athletes know which coaches have a basic understanding of female health.
Following the end of her WiHPS Residency Experience, Tammy moves into a new role in a new sport, as Netball Taranaki’s Development Officer and Smart Netball Activator, although she will continue to coach development triathletes part-time.
“Triathlon has been my sport for 10 years however I was finding it increasingly difficult to work remotely and was really missing face to face contact,” says Tammy.
“Despite the obvious differences between netball and triathlon – predominantly female, team, winter, older and well-resourced versus mixed gender, summer, largely individual, a newer sport with fewer resources – I’ve learnt how transferrable my skills are which is important for my long term career aspirations.”
Tammy sends a shout out to the HPSNZ team she’s dealt with over the last few years, especially WiHPS and Te Hāpaitanga leads, Helene Wilson and Jody Cameron. “They have given me the confidence to know I can do this. It’s really important to have women role models and be part of a group within the high performance sector. It empowers everyone to get better and to help each other. That is very powerful.”
