Club’s national title tally gets a boost

TITLE BOOST: Marguerite Vujcich surfs in a Gisborne Boardriders Club event. Her over-60s title at the national champs boosted the number of titles won by club competitors to nine. Picture by Paul Rickard

In the aftermath of the National Surfing Championships, Gisborne has found a surf champion who's boosted the club's national title tally to nine.

Marguerite Vujcich surfed, bodyboarded, SUPed and longboarded her way to four finals for Gisborne Boardriders Club in the week-long event.

Confusion arose because the event draw had Vujcich as being from Hawke's Bay, where she resides, but officially she was surfing for Gisborne Boardriders.

Surfing New Zealand (SNZ) events and co-ordination director Ben Kennings said the draw had her as being from Hawke's Bay because identifying contestants with their place of residence rather than the club they surf for reduced confusion.

Gisborne Boardriders (GBR) president Dan Croskery said the club had been operating off the information they had received from SNZ, which had been confusing.

“It was just confusing to everyone and was left out accidentally,” he said.

“We recognise her as a member of GBR . . . and we're amending it.”

Vujcich was the only surfer in the women's over-60 division and surfed in a final that included O-45 women. She scored a heat total of 2.2 to win the title.

In the women's bodyboarding open division she was paired up against the only other competitor, Piha's Ana Lucena, and narrowly missed out on a second title, losing by just half a point with a heat total of 12.5.

Vujcich also competed in the women's longboard and women's stand-up paddleboard (SUP) open division straight-finals where she finished fourth with heat scores of 2.4 and 3.7 respectively.