Westlake Boys’ High: Inside the culture driving the North Shore school’s sporting dominance

Westlake Boys' High School has become a sporting powerhouse in New Zealand secondary schools sport. Photo / Mike Smith

The Herald recently recognised Westlake Boys’ High School as New Zealand’s best sporting school for boys after an incredible 12 months of success. Its students brought home one national title in the major team sports tournaments but featured among the top four in five others. It’s incredibly rare and difficult to achieve that level of success across so many sporting codes in a single year – such is the standard across our school sports teams. What makes Westlake such a force? Mike Thorpe reports.

Westlake Boys’ High School is among the most sought-after public schools in the country. In its recent ballot for out-of-zone students they turned away more than 500 hopefuls. The ballot is a randomly generated “names from a hat” process rather than a cherry-picking exercise.

It doesn’t have boarders; it doesn’t offer scholarships. It does offer an environment, expertise and a culture that makes it the envy of many other schools.

“We do have good facilities and that’s something we focus on,” says headmaster Paul Fordham.

“That’s something that’s very important to us to make sure that we’ve got performance-level spaces for our boys and teams on site. But equally, we can’t provide for everything.”

With a roll of 2800 boys between Year 9 and Year 13, Westlake Boys’ High School is, according to Fordham, one of, if not the, biggest of boys’ schools in New Zealand. It is the only state boys’ school on the North Shore, and whilst its zone is not large, it is densely populated. Out-of-zone enrolments can come from a long way out.

“There’s Whangaparāoa Peninsula and some from Waiheke Island even, so we’ve got some who come from all over the area,” says Fordham.

Maadi Cup winners Westlake Boys' High School with headmaster Paul Fordham. Photo / Facebook

Among the attractions for potential enrolments is the quality of coaches and teachers that the school has in its sports programme. The rugby academy (Years 9-11) is run by former Kiwis captain and New Zealand rugby league great Hugh McGahan.

“When I see the results of it further on down the track, it just puts a smile on my face. The actual coaching and improving the boys and doing what we are doing at the school, it gives me pleasure, not just for the rugby, but for all of our other sports that we do,” says McGahan.

The 32-test veteran has been at the school for 12 years and says they’re blessed to have a school that invests in its resources.

“Our strength and conditioning [S&C] programme is exceptional. Having been involved in the professional side of things [playing for the Sydney Roosters] – and I still have access to some of the professional clubs overseas [like Melbourne Storm] – we’re on par with a lot of professional sports organisations from a S&C data input equipment [perspective]. We are blessed to have that,” says McGahan.

Former All Black Luke McAlister now coaches the Westlake Boys' High SChool First XV. Photo / Andrew Cornaga / Photosport

The First XV is coached by former All Black Luke McAlister, while the Second XV and sevens side is mentored by another former All Black in Lelia Masaga.

“Then we have a parent in Jeff Wilson who also helps out with coaching. So ... we’re lucky from that perspective. We’re always able to, through our connections, bring other players, former players or even current players to the school,” says McGahan.

Fordham believes the right personnel are crucial.

“Staffing is the best thing you can do for young people’s success, and it’s no different with teaching and learning,” says Fordham.

Rugby certainly benefits from the expertise within its programme. The Westlake Boys’ First XV reclaimed the title of best in the Blues region, accounting for Auckland 1A winners King’s College in the final. That gave them entry to the Top Four national finals in Palmerston North, where they were narrowly beaten by Feilding High School in the semifinal and Southland Boys’ High School in the playoff for third.

Other successes saw the First XI cricketers finish third at the Gillette Cup, the basketballers finish third at the nationals, and the First XI hockey and football both finishing fourth at their national tournaments.

Westlake Boys' First XI football side won their local competition and finished in the top four at the nationals. Photo / Facebook

Perhaps the most notable success of 2025 was the return of the Maadi Cup to the North Shore – the symbol of excellence in schoolboy rowing. Westlake powered home on the Lake Karāpiro course to see off the challenges of Christchurch crews St Bede’s College and Christ’s College.

Senior coach of the rowing programme is two-time world championship-winning cox and Westlake Boys’ old boy, Andy Hay.

“I’ve got to admit I do watch that race quite a lot. I watch it as a learning kind of exercise, but also just to kind of relive the day and that week because it was such a phenomenal week for the school and for the squad of boys,” says Hay.

1984 was the last time Westlake held the trophy. Hay is determined to ensure that the school won’t have to wait that long again.

“It took 41 years to get it back to the school. You want to do everything in your power to keep it in that trophy cabinet,” says Hay.

The former student has a long history and understanding of the school that he says he had “always” wanted to go to.

“When I was at school in the 70s, there was just this energy, especially around that Milford and Takapuna area. All these kids came off the beaches, and they were into sailing and rowing, and they were just good, solid, hardworking kids from sort of hard-working parents as well,” says Hay.

Nowadays, Hay believes the school is saddled with a reputation from rivals as being entitled. McGahan goes further than that.

“There’s a lot of schools and a lot of people who hate us because of the success we have. They just think it comes because of who we are, but there is still a lot of work that goes on in the background,” says McGahan.

Hugh McGahan runs at the Australian line, watched by Clayton Friend during New Zealand's famous 1987 win.

New students at Westlake learn that quickly, he says.

“There’s always the glamour or the glitz of Westlake in the sports programme, but it’s not until they actually get here that they understand what it’s about,” says McGahan.

The success of that programme has attracted and produced several leading athletes. Among them, basketballers Kirk Penney and Thomas Abercrombie, All Blacks Frano Botica, McAlister, Nick Evans and current England international Chandler Cunningham-South – as well as Black Caps Andre Adams, Lou Vincent and, more recently, Bevon Jacobs. Sailors Dean Barker and Chris Dickson also wore the Westlake colours.

Perhaps fuelling that perception by outsiders that an air of entitlement blows across the North Shore is the obvious desire of Westlake Boys’ High School students to maintain their incredibly high sporting standards. Hay says it was self-drive that pushed his crew over the line in March.

“They definitely had a collective desire to win. That was something they pretty much decided for themselves in some ways, and we just helped them along. They made this very strong commitment to just leave no stone unturned,” says Hay.

Westlake Boys' High School students "left no stone unturned" in their quest to win the Maadi Cup according to coach Andy Hay. Photo / Mike Smith

That culture of success is maintained by the students, but it is guided by the school’s leadership and implementation of standards.

“The boys aren’t allowed to play sport unless their attendance is at a certain rate, or a certain percentage. If they’re sick on a Friday and they can’t attend school, then they can’t play on a Saturday because they are sick,” says McGahan.

“The two values we talk a lot about here are excellence and courage. Courage is in our motto, ‘Virtute Experiamur, let courage be thy test’. And so those two things are synonymous with everything that we do,” adds Fordham.

Fordham believes their culture around courage and excellence leads to high expectations.

“Boys are amazing. If you put the bar high, boys will find a way. They will make it competitive, and they’ll find a way to jump over it. I see our job at Westlake as to just set the bar higher and higher and keep pushing it, because they will always amaze you with what they can achieve.”

Fordham, himself a former student of Westlake, points out that they’re not just a sporting school, and old boys such as Don McGlashan, Martin Henderson and AJ Hackett suggest their success is wide-reaching.

But sporting success is a well-established cornerstone of the school and has been since it opened in 1962.

Westlake Boys' High School Headmaster Paul Fordham.

“We know that having good sports programmes is important to support the success of boys in schools because it creates identity for them, it creates a sense of belonging,” says Fordham.

“It means that when they arrive at school every day, they’re passionate about the place that they’re coming to be educated. That’s important because the payoff is that we get improved academic outcomes as well.”

Academically, Westlake Boys’ High also features among the best-performing boys’ schools in New Zealand – state or private.

Mike Thorpe is a senior multimedia journalist for the Herald, based in Christchurch. He has been a broadcast journalist across television and radio for 20 years and joined the Herald in August 2024.