STRENGTH OF BODY AND MIND
Sport and study are all in a day’s work for ultra-driven athlete and undergraduate Katelyn Vaha’akolo.
WORDS NICKY ADAMS | PHOTOS SUPPLIED
Katelyn Vaha’akolo pushes high achieving to the next level. At only 26 years of age, she has already taken women’s rugby by storm as a professional dual international athlete, but these days, she’s discovering a whole new side of herself through her studies at the University of Waikato’s Tauranga campus.
That new side of herself is already earning recognition. As a first-year student at the University of Waikato, in September she was presented with the prestigious Sportswoman of the Year gong at the university’s annual Blues Awards, an event that recognises excellence in sport, the arts and service. Supported by the High Performance Sport New Zealand Prime Minister’s Athlete Scholarship, she’s studying a Bachelor of Laws degree at the Tauranga campus. It’s proof that there’s far more to Katelyn than what happens on the field. With all this on her plate, UNO was keen to find out how on earth she fits it all in.
On the field, her credentials are just as impressive. A cross-code player, Katelyn’s moved between league and union. From the Kiwi Ferns via the Newcastle Knights, she joined the Blues before playing for the Black Ferns in 2023.
Acknowledgement of her talent has come thick and fast, including being recognised as the World Rugby Women’s 15s Breakthrough Player in 2023, and the Blues Women’s Player and Back of the Year in 2024.
Perhaps the first thing to clarify is that Katelyn’s study isn’t an indicator of a huge life pivot – it’s more a case of adding even more strings to her bow. Despite studying law (with politics), she says becoming a lawyer has never been her end game. “I’m Polynesian and I’m very proud of where I come from. My desire to study law [comes from wanting] to learn so I can advocate for myself, for my Polynesian people.”
Katelyn with her parents, Cherith andEdward Vaha’akolo.
More than that, though, “when you’re a full-time professional athlete, sport can really consume your whole life. Studying was a way of getting my mind away from the rugby stuff. Uni has been a new avenue for me to spend some time away from the field.”
University of Waikato’s Tauranga campus has provided the perfect opportunity for Katelyn, but we can’t help but wonder how she finds enough hours in the day for both sport and study. “I soon learned to stop wasting time doomscrolling, which is good for me. I try to study every day, but I take one day to do absolutely no study whatsoever, and I think that allows me to rejuvenate myself so that I’m in a space to learn again.”
The flexibility of the course and the attitude of the staff also play a big part. Katelyn points out that the university goes above and beyond to make her situation work. “The lecturers and tutors have been great in catering to my needs as an athlete. They’ve given me all the resources and help that I could possibly ask for, so that I’m able to manage both.”
Even without the sport thing, Katelyn’s path to uni hasn’t been the standard one, and it’s inspirational for others who don’t feel as though they fit the standard educational mould. Katelyn dropped out of high school “not because I wasn’t smart, I’ve always been bright, but I really struggled in the learning and classroom environments. Because of my ADHD, it was hard for me to manage in those spaces as a teenager, but I think now with uni I can learn on my own terms, and learn things that I’m genuinely interested in and that I’m passionate about. I’m definitely grateful that I started now, when I have more of an understanding of myself, rather than going straight out of school.”
As for the acknowledgement of her outstanding performance by way of the recent Blues Award, she says it blew her away. “I wasn’t expecting it at all and felt very, very humbled. It’s a blessing to be recognised for an achievement like this.”
So what’s next? “The 2028 Olympics!”