Georgina Galloway is only 16, but she is the Wanaka Rowing Club's guru.
One year ago, she co-founded the club with the help of her family, friends and former Otago Rowing Club member Dave Varney, previously of Dunedin and now a Wanaka real estate agent.
The club boasts about 40 members, many of whom are novices, but performing strongly in age-group and secondary school competition.
Georgina's love affair with rowing began when she was a pupil at Columba College for three years.
She enjoyed the sport but when she returned to Wanaka and enrolled at Mt Aspiring College last year, she thought she would have to give it up because Wanaka did not have a club.
Georgina's mother, Marg, heard that Mr Varney, whom she did not know, was a former rower. She approached him last year to see if he could help.
"I started rowing when I was 10 as a cox . . . But I had retired from rowing and moved up here . . . I was starting to get fat and so, living by the lake, I decided to buy myself a boat and start up rowing again. Then I got injured.
" Georgina had moved back to Wanaka and missed the sport. She heard I had a boat . . . That's how the whole thing started, and I became her coach," Mr Varney explained this week.
The club was eventually founded in October 2007.
Georgina trains on Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday mornings from 6.30 and twice at weekends.
She has also started strength training and during the winter, she travelled to Dunedin every week to train with the Otago under-20 women's team.
At the interprovincial championships in Wanganui on Sep-tember 27, Georgina and her Otago team-mates were unfortunate to not be racing for a medal after the time trials.
The young crew of Fiona Bourke, Anna Price, Hazel Dawson and Georgina took it to their older and more experienced opposition from around the country, but finished fifth overall after match racing.
Mr Varney described his young charge as the Wanaka club's role model.
"It is pretty hard with a new club. I didn't realise until I went through this exercise, but with clubs, there is always a history to it, people you can look up to, people of stature and mana. Starting one from scratch with no-one to look up to is very difficult, so we use George for that," Mr Varney said.
Between events and training, Georgina and her rowing friends have been collecting and selling pinecones and firewood to raise money for the club, which is based at a shed at the Upper Clutha showgrounds.
Georgina is now in year 12 at Mt Aspiring College and is thrilled with the progress of the club.
"It was just hard because people weren't used to the sport. They don't really understand it that well. But we are getting there slowly. We are just trying to recruit people now from the school," she said.
Georgina recently became the proud owner of a brand new single scull and thanks her grandmother for helping her out.
"She put in half the money, which was pretty amazing. It is awesome," Georgina said on Wednesday.
Georgina's mother is the club secretary and said community and parent support for the club members had been "fantastic".
The Wellman family, also co-founders, are deeply involved in the sport, while Wanaka businessman Ian Farrant helped get the club off the ground by donating an undisclosed amount to buy the club's first two boats, a second-hand quad and a new double.
The Lion Foundation gave the club a $15,000 grant towards a new $25,000 quad, which the club has named the "David Varney", much to Mr Varney's embarrassment.
Club members have also raised several thousand dollars more through delivering newspapers, cleaning up at the Wanaka Rodeo and helping out at functions and parties.
The club now boasts three doubles, two fours and an eight, plus a boat trailer donated by a parent, Phil Thompson.
The club's main goal this season is to begin negotiating with the Queenstown Lakes District Council for permission to build a lakeside clubhouse on a public reserve so athletes can launch straight into the lake without having to carry their boats across sports fields and roads.
Mr Varney said rowing in general was proving popular in Wanaka because the lake was close by and because New Zealand representatives had performed well internationally.
The Maadi Cup school competition (held at Lake Karapiro and Twizel in alternate years) was now the biggest regatta in the southern hemisphere.
North Island clubs were also experiencing growth and creating competition with South Islanders, he said.
