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Home / Rotorua Daily Post

Rotorua's Hansen boys love their sport

David Beck
By David Beck
Multimedia sports journalist·Rotorua Daily Post·
7 Jun, 2018 01:09 AM3 mins to read

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Mason has cerebral palsy which affects his movement on the left-hand side of his body, but do not think for a second that it stops him keeping up with his brothers.

Think of a sport, any sport. There is a good chance one of the Hansen boys has played it.

Between them, Dante, 11, Tyson, 10, Devan, 6, and Mason, 6, play rugby, league, touch, basketball and jiu-jitsu.

The boys' parents, Sherri and Jake Hansen, act as a taxi service between games and practices each week, but you get the feeling they would not have it any other way.

"At first we encouraged them to play sport and said we'd see if they like it, we didn't push it and they've just loved all of them," Jake said

"They got into jiu-jitsu because friends from rugby were doing it. There's a lot of parents out there like this though, their kids are busy every day, we're just one family." Sherri said the two younger boys wanted to do everything Dante and Tyson were doing.

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"We were taking them to trainings and [Devan and Mason] were still in nappies but they'd come along and it was just natural for them to follow," she said.

The brothers Hansen Dante, 11, (left), Mason, 6, Devan, 6, and Tyson, 10, are sports mad. Photo / Ben Fraser
The brothers Hansen Dante, 11, (left), Mason, 6, Devan, 6, and Tyson, 10, are sports mad. Photo / Ben Fraser

The youngest, Mason, has left-sided hemiplegia, a form of cerebral palsy which affects his movement on the left-hand side of his body, but do not think for a second it stops him keeping up with his brothers.

"It doesn't stop him, he's always out there with his brothers. He's the most keen out of all of them to get out there, he loves his sports every weekend," Sherri said.

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"When he was about 8 months old I was concerned about why he wasn't crawling and stuff. They did an MRI scan and they showed us that the right side of his brain was smaller than the left side. The doctor at the time actually did say to us that he probably wouldn't be a rugby player."

Upon hearing Mum say that, during the interview for this article, Mason chimed in: "But I am a rugby player!" Which perfectly summed up his attitude towards his disability.

"There was never any doubt in his mind or ours that he would play sport, he was always the one trying to run on the field when his older brothers were playing."

Jake said there were a lot of life lessons children could learn through playing sport.

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"It's a bit of everything, there's a lot of things they can apply to their lives like dedicating themselves to something." Sherri said it was also good for young boys to be active and burn some energy.

Broken windows and injuries are all part of the process but the non-stop activity is part of the family dynamic and, for the Hansens, it works.

"There's always something every day - a lot of trainings and games. I play hockey myself on a Monday night so we have to fit that in too, we coach and manage too. We just fit it all in."

If there was any doubt about whether the four brothers were competitive with each other, it was made certain when, asked who the best athlete was, four hands shot into the air.

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