Irene Van Dyk - Nominated for Sportswoman of the Year

Irene van Dyk and her daughter Bianca at Speldhurst Park, 26 January

Silver Ferns Goal Shoot, and Stokes Valley resident Irene van Dyk has been nominated for the Halberg Trust's Say When Sportswoman of the Year award.  There are three other nominations in this category: Melissa Moon (Athletics), Leilani Joyce (Squash) and Marlene Castle (Bowls). Similar awards will also be given for Sportsman of the Year, Sports Team of the Year and Sports Coach of the Year. Nominations come from the Trust's Voting Academy, who also narrow down the 12 initial nominations in each category to just four.

Winners will be announced at the 2001 Awards Dinner which will be held at the Queens Wharf Events Centre in Wellington on Thursday, 28 February 2002. The awards will be televised in a one hour show on TV1, commencing at 8:30 p.m.

Thursday 25 January, and I'm calling my 14 year old netball-keen daughter, Esther to let her know that Irene van Dyk has agreed to an interview. Best news of all is that Irene is more than happy for Esther to tag along. Esther has played netball for her school for a couple of years and was pretty knowledgeable about the Silver Ferns, so on Saturday morning, in the car on the way to meet Irene, I find myself first interviewing Esther to make sure my own knowledge is adequate, and that the questions I plan to ask are good ones.

We'd agreed to meet at Speldhurst Park on Saturday morning, and when we arrive I'm relieved to find that Irene has decided to combine the interview and a trip to the park with her 3½ year old daughter Bianca. I know that her life is busy and I want to impinge as lightly as I can upon her schedule. Though I've seen her play netball numerous times on TV, I'm still a little struck by her height, yet she moves with grace, and her smile of greeting is warm and genuine.

We select a park bench where we can sit and talk in the bright Stokes Valley sun.  We're there for about 30 minutes and our conversation is regularly punctuated by passing kids calling out their recognition, or by Bianca returning from the swings. I realise that I'm standing in the way of an iceblock, and try to keep things moving. Irene's attention flits easily between myself and Bianca, each of my questions being answered with enthusiasm and detail despite the fact that she's probably been asked them all a million times before.

Did the nomination come to her as a surprise?  Well, yes it did because netball is a team sport. "You'd think they would give the award to the whole team, not to an individual player." She's quick to point out that she's nothing without the team, that they work hard to get the ball to her, and are just as deserving of praise for every goal that she successfully shoots. From there conversation naturally flows to whether or not she received any similar recognition in South Africa when she was captain of their national team, the Proteas. I'm surprised to hear that no, netball is not a serious competitor to rugby, cricket or boxing in South Africa, and that it is rarely shown on TV.  "Things will probably change there as they have here over the years," we agree, and Irene points out that she is very hopeful that sporting opportunities for women in South Africa will continue to expand.

Referring to her 45 goals out of 47 attempts in New Zealand's 58-47 Tri-Nations win against Australia, I ask her outright, what makes her so good? As she would do numerous times during the interview, Irene diverts attention away from herself and to the team as a whole. She remembers that night well, the whole team playing with such confidence and being "on a roll," really working together as one. Her success at the goal was just a natural extension of the whole team's excellence that night.

We speak about how important it is to New Zealanders to beat Australia on the sporting field and I ask her whether that attitude has infected her as well. "Definitely!" Irene's answer is spoken with passion. "The Aussies are Number One. It's definitely an attitude I have picked up. You try to play your best in every game but you have to beat the Aussies." Australia may be recognised as Number One in netball, but Irene feels that our teams are pretty evenly matched at the moment. "If New Zealand and Australia are playing, it is hard to say who will win. It depends on whoever is playing the better game at the time." I'm pleased to hear that games against Australia are treated uniquely by the Silver Ferns. Games against other countries are almost seen like training where targets set usually have to do with the amount of goals they will win by. With Australia it's different. Everything is so focussed. "We have to win against the Number Ones!"

And what was it like to play against South Africa? Irene admits that the first time she played against the international side she used to captain and heard their national anthem playing, she felt emotional. She slips in an anecdote about NZ captain Bernice Mene dropping a humorous comment to her about a character in the crowd at the time, and says that it really broke the tension as they laughed together on court. Then it was simply "BRING IT ON!!"  She says that South Africa have pretty much been behind her all the way, despite her permanent move here, and that the South African public were overwhelming in their support for her, and for the Silver Ferns in their games against Australia.

Netball was never a big sport in South African schools, and I ask Irene about what got her started. As a youngster she was very much into athletics and hurdles, and even then felt she had a future in sport. It was not until she was a teenager that her height gave her a real advantage on the netball court. She played for her school team, then the Under 19 team, and eventually found herself captaining the Proteas.

Irene admits that Netball demands a lot personally. Her busy daily schedule begins at 6 a.m. when she rises to care for Bianca. She works full time as a teacher in the Hutt Valley, and then trains for netball for two hours every single evening, unless there is a Silver Ferns game on. Somehow she's also fitting in lessons in public speaking so that she can feel more confident speaking to crowds of people in English instead of her native Afrikaans.

How do you manage and cope with it all? "I have a wonderful husband, Christie, and a very understanding daughter." She attributes much of her success to the love and support of Christie who helps keep her organised and focussed. A sporting coach himself (cricket), Christie even helps with her own training at times. "He really pushes me hard," she laughs. "The guys he trains refer to his methods as boot camp and I can see why."  Very much a sporting family, the van Dyks often watch sport to relax. Irene loves both the Black Caps and the All Blacks and follows their progress closely. She's thrilled about New Zealand's current cricketing success. To relax, Irene enjoys playing with Bianca, family quad-biking on the river, and picnics in the sun.

A kid bikes by our bench. "Hey, that's Irene van Dyk!" he calls out to no one in particular. Irene has a "Good morning" and a warm smile for him too. It seems a good time to ask her what impact celebrity has had on her life in a land where we adore our sporting heroes. In short she enjoys it. Her ease in talking to me, and the willingness with which she posed for photos with my daughter (and signed her netball shirt) illustrate her enjoyment at being recognised and talking with people. But she doesn't take the fame itself that seriously. She tells me the amusing story of her arrival in New Zealand. Not being used to fame or recognition for netball, she didn't realise that all the press and cameras were for her, and she kept looking back though the line of arrivals figuring that there must be someone important back there to warrant all the excitement.

Irene loves New Zealand and New Zealanders. She now considers this to be her home and is in the process of establishing permanent residency. She arrived here with very little, and when the principal of the school at which she works put out the word, Irene found herself overwhelmed with welcomes and gifts, to the point that her house virtually became fully furnished in the space of a day. "That sort of thing just wouldn't happen in South Africa."

And how did you come to choose Stokes Valley as the place where you wanted to live? Irene admits that was pretty much a fluke. "We were driving around looking at houses, and saw this one for sale. It was very nice, isolated and in a beautiful spot near a little river." They have never regretted buying it and think Stokes Valley is a wonderful place in which to live. "It's very beautiful, and we love how central it is to everything.  The neighbourhood kids are really nice and they play with Bianca a lot." The van Dyks love the openness, safety and security of New Zealand, having come from a land where private residences are often surrounded by six-foot fences, and where houses have bars on the windows.

It's time to make a move. Bianca really wants that ice-block and I've taken up enough of Irene's time. She poses for a couple of photos, signs Esther's shirt and we head for the car. As we drive off, Irene pauses to look up and wave us off. I'm thinking to myself as we head down Stokes Valley Road that New Zealand really is a great place in which to be - all the better for the grace and excellence brought to our public arena by the likes of this humble, yet truly remarkable kiwi girl.