The New Zealand Olympics team had an 'incredible' Games, enjoying a record medals haul at the 2020 Tokyo Olympics. The country's sports chiefs have hailed the athletes for what they described as "incredible Olympics games." Indeed, the nation of some 5 million people burnished its own reputation, punching way above its weight with this record medals haul. At the Tokyo Olympics, New Zealand won 7 gold medals, 6 silver and 7 bronzes. The country finished 13th on the overall medals table edging out many other countries including Spain, and South Korea. Robert Waddell, New Zealand's chef de mission at the games, said this: "This was a really incredible performance!" He was speaking to the TVNZ during an interview.
Waddell continued: "We have enjoyed a lot how the entire team came together and achieved this feat. I think this is partly because we haven't had our family and friends over here. We've enjoyed a tight-knit team feeling; yes, we all drew lots of inspiration from witnessing each other's successes."
New Zealand's impressive medal tally was boosted by Lisa Carrington, the national sprint sensation, who won accolades as the most decorated Olympian. The athlete won three gold medals in Tokyo; she did this soon after claiming the third successive kayak single 200 meters medal. She already claimed a gold medal in the same event at the Rio Olympics in 2016. New Zealand won in her traditional strongholds. The country won two silvers and three golds in the rowing competition. The women's rugby 7s team dominated the competition, winning gold; the men won silver.
According to Waddell, the most thrilling factor was the boxing and trampoline medal wins- these were generally unexpected. "All these medals were won across 11 different sports disciplines. This is great for New Zealand since it's not merely a single sport that's dominating," he said. "Think about what Dylan Schmidt did in the trampolining event, what David Nyika accomplished in boxing. These are trailblazers for young New Zealanders who might follow their footsteps; who knows; they might achieve similar success in the future."
The Tokyo 2020 historic Olympics haul is a continuation of New Zealand's track record; the country is specializing in doing more with less. The achievements in Tokyo were especially remarkable, coming hot on the heels of New Zealand's fantastic victory over the renowned cricket powerhouse, India. The latter achievement was realized in the inaugural World Test Championship cricket final in June 2021. "New Zealand is very collaborative. We all work together exceedingly well. We're big enough to do that but not too big to be clumsy," Waddel said.
Before the start of the Tokyo Olympics, many New Zealand newspapers were hopeful- they had various optimistic headlines like "The New Zealand Team Has High Hopes of a Record Olympic Games." The newspaper story described the Tokyo team as the largest Kiwi team-with more than 200 athletes. The media shed light on the exploits of promising athletes who'd carry the nation's fortunes. It reported that the Tokyo Olympics crystal ball looked much like a swirling snow globe, only a week before the competition started. But the report admitted that it's not easy to predict precisely how the athletes would fate. "This is much tougher than trying to book a MIQ ticket using a dial-up modem. This is how we can describe the effect of Covid-19 on various sporting competitions," one media said. Due to coronavirus, the Tokyo Olympics were postponed a whole year.
Many other major world events could not be held for at least 18 months. It became virtually impossible to train the magnifying glass on the world's elite athletes in a single gathering throughout the period. Thus, New Zealand's team went to the Tokyo Olympics with limited, somewhat imperfect information on precisely what to expect. Regardless, the legitimate pointers indicated there were genuine reasons why the NZ sports fans would be licking their lips at the events they were likely to witness over the four weeks.
In the end, as noted, it had been a golden Summer Olympics for New Zealand in the 2012 London Games. The Kiwis had won 13 medals at these games. This was about the same medal haul that New Zealand realized at the record-setting Seoul Olympics in 1988. But New Zealand set a new record only four years later at the Rio Olympics in Brazil; New Zealand had 18 gongs. According to Sport New Zealand, the country had a target of winning more than 16 medals at the Tokyo Olympics.