Kiwi Campbell after winning the master women's W1 500m final at the waka ama sprint nationals on Lake Karapiro in January 2024. Photo / Garrick Cameron
Kiwi Campbell after winning the master women's W1 500m final at the waka ama sprint nationals on Lake Karapiro in January 2024. Photo / Garrick Cameron
Waka ama world champion competitor and elite coach the late Kiwi Campbell received a posthumous induction into the Tairāwhiti Legends of Sport at the recent Tairāwhiti Sports Awards. John Gillies looks back at her career.
The joy and the sadness of Kiwi Campbell lay in what she had achieved, whatshe still had to give and the loss felt by those who loved her.
Campbell died in Gisborne in November 2024 at the age of 43.
The waka ama world joined her family and friends, and the local netball community in mourning the loss of an elite athlete, coach and leader.
Kiwi Campbell’s standing in the sport of waka ama was recognised in her induction this month into the Tairāwhiti Legends of Sport.
She was a waka ama world champion coach and competitor, having served as elite women’s national coach. In 2016 she guided the New Zealand women’s team to victory in every race they contested at the IVF World Sprint Championships on the Sunshine Coast in Australia.
In doing so, she helped New Zealand to the top of the medal tally for the first time.
She was a driving force in the Horouta Waka Hoe Club, coaching primarily female – but also male – crews to national and international prominence.
Women’s competitive feats were instrumental in Horouta Waka Hoe Club winning the national sprint championships points trophy 12 of the 13 times it had been contested up to 2024. Kiwi Campbell’s influence was there in the spirit shown in January 2025 as Horouta made it 13 trophy wins.
Brothers Maia (left) and Mairangi Campbell accepted their late mother Kiwi's inducation into the Tairāwhiti Legends of Sport from Rahia Timutimu, of Tūranga FM at the Tairāwhiti Sports Awards. Photo / Brennan Thomas, Strike Photography
Campbell started her waka ama (outrigger canoe) career with New Zealand’s first waka ama club, Mareikura, under the influence of a pioneer of the sport, Matahi Brightwell.
When Horouta Waka Hoe was formed, she quickly became an essential asset to the new club. Her willingness to help young paddlers was noted early – she coached teams from 2001 – and the club’s administrators backed her with the resources she needed to develop talent.
Campbell’s teams prospered through a combination of commitment and hard work, but they also benefited from a modern approach to sports science and nutrition, and meticulous attention to detail where technique was concerned.
A watershed moment for the Campbell coaching method was the gold-medal-winning performance at the 2012 world sprint championships in Calgary, Canada. There, Campbell’s Kaiarahi Toa open women’s team won the V6 500-metre sprint and were first to finish the 1500m turns race, only to lose it on a disqualification – a common occurrence in turns events.
Kaiarahi Toa continued to be a dominant force in women’s national and international paddling. By coaching across the age groups, Campbell spotted emerging talent and promoted paddlers to senior level when their performance warranted it.
Consequently, the Horouta club’s elite women’s crew regenerated continuously, seamlessly.
Campbell had the knack of putting together teams where those with strong personalities were moulded into a cohesive force, a task in which she was aided by a capable team of helpers.
As a paddler, she won consecutive premier women’s W1 500m national titles in 2013 and 2014 and the master women’s W1 crown in 2021 and 2024. Husband Bruce was the master men’s champion over the distance in 2024, and sons Mairangi and Maia are also elite-level paddlers.
Kiwi Campbell’s mother, Irene Takao, also was an influential coach in Horouta Waka Hoe, and a coach of the YMP premier grade netball team with whom Kiwi enjoyed local championship success.
Campbell was a two-time winner of Coach of the Year at the Maori Sports Awards and was a finalist in the same category at the Halberg Awards.
In 2020 she was inducted into the Waka Ama New Zealand virtual Hall of Fame.
She worked with youth in programmes centred on environmental learning and was on the board of Waka Ama NZ.
Horouta Waka Hoe Club chairman Walton Walker said: “Kiwi led by example. ‘Pick yourself up and follow me’ was her example, and if you couldn’t keep up she would come alongside you and help you keep up.”
