Olympic Games: Three gold medal winners in Hawke’s Bay in one week

Emma Twigg will join Hawke's Bay Rowing Club clubmates for a celebration of her success, in a boat made in Hawke's Bay. Photo / Steve McArthur / www.photosport.nz

Three New Zealanders who have won Olympic gold medals on the water will be in Hawke’s Bay for separate appearances less than a week apart later this month.

The first will be Central Otago canoe slalom representative Finn Butcher, who will be joined by Hawke’s Bay-based Olympic Games team Chef de Mission Nigel Avery in a ticketed Hawke’s Bay Canoe Slalom function at the Napier Old Boys Marist Park Island clubrooms on November 22.

Butcher, who is coached by Hawke’s Bay Canoe Club member Aaron Osborne, won the inaugural canoe slalom kayak cross event at the Paris games on August 5.

Cambridge-based former World and Olympic Games women’s single sculls rowing champion and three-times Hawke’s Bay Supreme Sports Award winner Emma Twigg will join Hawke’s Bay Rowing Club clubmates at Marine Parade bar The Pavilion on November 23 to celebrate her Olympics silver medal success this year in a boat made by club members Simon and Hamish Lack.

Finn Butcher, who this year won gold in the inaugural Olympic Games canoe slalom kayak cross, with a coach from Hawke's Bay. He will be at a function in Napier on November 22. Photo / NZME

The third appearance, at the rowing club at Clive on November 27, will be that of 2020 Olympic Games coxless pairs gold medalist Kerri Williams (née Gowler), who won a bronze medal with the coxless four this year, and who has since retired after more than a decade in international competition.

Doug Laing is a senior reporter based in Napier with Hawke’s Bay Today, and has 51 years of journalism experience, 41 of them in Hawke’s Bay, in news gathering, including breaking news, sports, local events, issues, and personalities.