Janette turns 87 this year. She and her husband Stuart Robb, 92 this year, were keen tennis and squash players.
Stuart won 22 New Zealand veterans’ tennis titles, many of them with good friend Bill Roberts, who has since died. Janette won around eight national veterans’ tennis titles.
Stuart and Janette were also representative badminton players.
Stuart was the man who restrung tennis rackets in Guy and Dunsmore for 15 years, and he still plays the occasional social game of tennis.
These days, Janette is content to watch — not create — the action on the tennis or squash courts.
Down the generations, family members have played both tennis and squash.
“Tennis is good for your squash, but it doesn’t work the other way round,” Carolyn said.
“After playing a lot of squash, you can find it very hard to keep the ball in the court and over the net in tennis.”
Carolyn had been a travelling reserve in the C Grade women’s team who had competed in the national tournament in Auckland in 1999.
They were seeded 10th out of 10 teams but they won the title. Carolyn did not get to play in that tournament, although her younger sister, Lynda Collier, did.
Carolyn was determined to join Lynda in the playing members of the team for the following year’s tournament in Gisborne, and her training efforts paid off.
They both made the team, who were seeded 10th again despite being the titleholders, and the club retained the C Grade women’s championship.
“Seedings are based on the individual players’ gradings,” Carolyn said.
“The gradings are calculated on the basis of the players you beat, but you have to go away, and we didn’t travel to many outside tournaments.”
She and Lynda both eventually competed at B Grade level.
Carolyn’s years as a competitive squash player ran from about 1995 to 2010. Her husband Brian Baty became interested in tennis and squash through her. After they bought an orchard at Bushmere, they played squash at the Waerenga-a-Hika courts, but lately have played tennis more.
Squash was also a family affair for Lynda, who married B Grade player Phil Collier.
Down a generation, the pattern continued.
Carolyn’s daughter Catherine became an avid squash player, and Catherine’s husband Tom Harbott took up the game.
“I used to be able to beat him,” Catherine said.
“He’s a B Grade player now.”
Catherine is also a B Grade player as a result of the tournament success. Her brother Jason Baty is an A Grade player.
Gisborne’s distance from other centres still presents challenges to teams preparing for national tournaments.
“We did a lot of fitness work, rackets, ball skills,” Catherine said.
“We did team training . . . (coach) Avon Moleta was there for every training session.”
She recalled 92s, 10 10s, figure 8s — different ways to run up, down and across the 9.75-metre-by-6.4m squash court. The 92 lengths of the court that made a set of 92s might be only 897 metres in total; it was the 91 turns that got you.
“Squash is harder on the body than tennis,” Carolyn said.
“Those four walls don’t bend.”
Catherine said it was a fast game demanding physical fitness . . . “fast and furious”.
She and Tom have two children — brothers Bodhi, 4, and Boston, 3. They are already playing squash.
And if Bodhi and Boston keep playing, Catherine and Tom may find themselves spectators at their successes, just as Carolyn and Brian Baty were in Napier last week.
“We were babysitting the boys until Friday lunchtime, when their other grandparents took over,” Carolyn said.
“We decided on the spur of the moment to drive through to Napier to watch the end of the tournament. We caught the semifinal and final. It was great.
“Catherine didn’t know we were coming.”
But Carolyn and Brian are not finished as competitors either.
This weekend they are in Napier for the Tennis Seniors Hawke’s Bay Tournament — the men’s and women’s doubles today and mixed doubles tomorrow.
Racket sports seem to have a niche for every age group.
