Suzanne McFadden for LockerRoom
When Shonté To’a defends her Z Manu World Championship title in Auckland this weekend, she’ll be doing it for her 10-year-old son.
The Auckland mum, who’s also a top league player, wants him to see that backing yourself – and having fun while making the biggest manu splash – pays off.
And it’s young Khylan who’s driving To’a to keep competing, even though she’s carrying an injury.
“This is a connection piece for me – from me and my dad doing bombs, and now me and my son,” she says. “That’s the thing that keeps me going back to this competition. Manus have been part of my everyday life – but competing is to tautoko [support] my son, because he really wanted to do it, too.
“After I won last year, he wanted to do it again, which means we go again. And I’ll keep going as long as he’s enjoying it.”
A former Auckland Storm rugby fullback who then switched to league, To’a injured her kneecap last season, sidelining her on-field career for 12 months – but steering her into coaching the Auckland women’s champions, the Pukekohe Pythons.
Still, she’ll defend her title at the Z Manu World Champs grand final. “I haven’t popped more than 10 manus since my injury, but I’m going to show up,” she says. “I want to show I may be restricted, but I can still do it.”
Khylan competed in Hamilton – one of 12 qualifier events across nine New Zealand cities and the Gold Coast this summer – finishing seventh in the rangatahi/youth male manu. “He wasn’t on the leaderboard last year, but since then he’s been practising consistently, which is so wholesome to see because that’s what we did as kids,” To’a says.
Encouraging tamariki and rangatahi to be physically active while having fun is a major focus of the event, now in its third year. “They don’t realise the mechanics you need to pop a manu – the repetition grows your muscles,” says To’a, who works supporting youth development through the New Zealand Warriors Community Foundation. “You’re exercising in a way that’s fun, so they don’t see it as exercise.”
Around 2000 competitive jumpers have made a splash in this year’s regional events – while over 5000 had a go in the free Push Play Manu sessions at pools around the country.
Scott Rice, founder of the Z Manu World Champs, says there’s been an increased level of awareness around the event this summer.
“There have been bigger crowds, more buzz, and more registrations for qualifier spots this year,” he says. “We’re seeing a huge number of younger boys and girls watching the older kids then really wanting to get into it. It’s something social for them to do with mates, to get out of the house, and it’s free.”
The best 135 bombers will compete in a showdown at the Karanga Plaza harbour pool in Auckland’s Wynyard Quarter on Saturday. There’s the classic Manu division – with kids, youth and adult categories – and the freestyle division, renamed Anything But a Manu, for bombers of all ages who want to show off their flips and flair.
The definition of a manu: where the body is in a clear V-shape and the bum hits the water first.
“Most jumpers under 25 are popping a manu style of bomb – they add their own flair to it in the air on the way down, with a back flip or a cheese cutter. Once they hit the water, it’s manu style,” Rice says.
A competitive swimmer in his youth, Rice did old school dive bombs as a kid off the Lake Pupuke jetty in Auckland but admits he’s still perfecting his manu. “You’ve got to be quite flexible and land on your bum, and if you don’t do it right, you get a really good slap – which I’ve certainly done.”
For the first time, the Manu World Champs has extended beyond New Zealand and into the Gold Coast, where Diving Queensland ran a qualifier event. “They saw an opportunity to diversify and added dive bombing,” Rice says. “They had a great turnout of Aussies and expat Kiwis on Waitangi weekend.”
Four Australian jumpers will contest the grand final in Auckland. Rice reckons there’s also interest in expanding into Japan and Hawaii.
The technology to judge a manu is also evolving. The grand final will use award-winning software developed with AUT professor of sports performance biomechanics, Patria Hume, called ManuTech. It videos and freeze-frames each manu to calculate the splash height and now uses underwater hydrophones to measure the “pop” on impact.
“It’s a really accurate and quick way to judge the splash, and it’s been fantastic technology for us,” Rice says.
In fact, ManuTech earned the event the Technology Innovation of the Year at last year’s New Zealand Event Awards. It’s also being developed into a mobile app using AI for automated measurement.
Other elements – like creativity, style and pop – are introduced to the score in the grand final to measure the success of a manu splash. Among the judges are All Black Piri Weepu, an ambassador of the Manu World Champs since they began, and Jay Kay, who runs the bomb squad at Hamilton’s Waterworld.
“We’re celebrating something uniquely Kiwi; providing a platform for these jumpers who are passionate about manu to really succeed on a big stage,” said Rice.
Confident the event will continue to gather momentum, Z Energy has renewed its sponsorship through to the 2029 grand final.
Each year, Z Energy supports wildcard entrants, especially those who can’t make it to a qualifier event. The wildcards uncovered talent such as Whangārei’s Maara Toa – who came through in 2024 and went on to win the world adult male champion title in last year’s grand final. Toa will be back to defend his title this weekend.
Also returning are last year’s freestyle world champ, William Fraser, Ella Mohi Henare, crowned the first world youth champion, and girls’ world champ Aila McQueen.
Shonté To’a made last year’s grand final after entering on a whim, and became a world champion with a splash height of 8.02m and a pop of 7. Her secret to perfecting a manu? To have fun.
“When you have fun at anything, you’ll naturally get better at it,” she says – a mantra she impresses on her son as well. “Better never stops.”
This story was originally published at Newsroom.co.nz and is republished with permission.