What do Pulse and Silver Fern netballers do in their spare time? They get to drive a range of vehicles while taking their love of the game to fans and players.
As a long-standing sponsor of the Central Pulse we have been privileged to work with some of New Zealand’s best netballers. Recently, as well as winning the ANZ Premiership, some of them took on the world and won the 2019 Netball World Cup. The best thing is that they love to give back.
Here are a few things they have been up to with us:
We took Karin Burger, Aliyah Dunn and Claire Kersten to visit two customers. The reaction was fantastic. The first customer had invited a number of friends and put on a wonderful spread complete with yellow and black serviettes and lollies. And the second customer visit was more great food and sharing thoughts about netball, plus getting photos of course!
Then on Sunday 21 July our service car park took on a different look as ten Year 9 and 10 netballers had a skills session with Claire Kersten, midcourter for the ANZ netball championship-winning Central Pulse. The weather wasn’t the best but the girls enjoyed learning from Claire.
In the first week of Term 2 it was back to school for Claire Kersten (a teacher when she’s not playing netball). She made a surprise visit to a netball team from Sacred Heart College in Lower Hutt. The coach wanted to do something special for the team and approached us to see if we could help. We were able to get Claire and the ANZ Premiership trophy to go along to the team practice. And later in the week Claire visited Greenacres School in Tawa.
Deputy Principal, Ange Lamb, who arranged the visit with us said “Our netballers were all buzzing after the visit and particularly enjoyed the opportunity to ask questions, get Claire’s signature and share the cup. It was great to share Claire and the cup with the whole school to inspire other students to get involved in netball.”
A couple of days after returning from the netball World Cup we put Ameliaranne Ekenasio into a Mitsubishi Outlander PHEV. She loves the ability to drive in hybrid mode and have the regenerative braking restore the battery. She’s also a fan of the roominess of the vehicle, and the heated leather seats.
Ameliaranne then came to try out a Hyundai Ioniq PHEV. She’s appreciating the extra range of this vehicle, and is happy to have plenty of room for all the whanau.
Most recently Karin Burger has started to enjoy the benefits of a Hyundai Tucson. She’s loving the large – but not too large – size of this vehicle, and also sitting up high. It helps her to keep an eye on things just as she needs to on the netball court.
Karin has also been taking her medal out to our service departments and meeting excited customers.
