Rowing New Zealand has turned to rugby in a bid to build on its success.
Rowing officials have held meetings with their rugby counterparts in Wellington, aiming to set up four regional high-performance centres around the country to complement the work being done at the national centre at Karapiro.
In
effect, they are tendering the franchises along the same models as the Super 12, with rowing strongholds like Auckland, Wanganui, Christchurch, Blenheim, Dunedin and Hawke's Bay bidding for them.
The centres are designed as a pathway for promising athletes who might either drop out of the sport in the transition between school and club rowing, or choose another sport.
"It is critical," said rowing high-performance manager Andrew Matheson.
"It's a huge initiative. We're targeting to have four set up in the next two to three months.
"What they are is basically replicating to a certain degree here what we do at the national set up. It gives the up-and-coming athletes, like our school athletes, very clear targets.
"If they are going well and would like to become Olympic athletes, here's a pathway for them."
There has been some resistance from traditional clubs who see their power base eroding, but Matheson said: "It comes from not understanding what we're trying to do. We're just trying to lift the bar in our domestic programme, because if we lift the bar there it will bring us closer to what we're trying to do at international level."
Athletes will have access to the best coaches and sports scientists from an early stage of their development, rather than playing catch-up after habits have been formed.
Rowing is on a high in New Zealand following success at the elite level recently, success it is hoped will be emulated at the junior and under-23 worlds starting soon.
The New Zealand junior rowing team competes at the worlds in Brandenburg, Germany, next week.
"We've got some good crews," Andrew Matheson said. "We've got a men's eight, a men's double and a women's four, and looking at the numbers we're producing now, we're quite a big step up from where we were last year.
"We've got five crews also at the under-23 champs in Amsterdam and they're producing really good numbers as well."
- HERALD ON SUNDAY
