With the Ohakune Squash Club located next door to the college and many of our staff being members of the club it is no surprise that a number of students are involved in the sport.

Students are exposed to squash through the Physical Education and Health programme and some choose to pursue the sport further utilizing the onsite facilities in breaks and lunches.

Mr Laurenson is the coach for the Ruapehu College players and runs many coaching sessions throughout the year. In term 2 during the lead up to Squash Nationals the students have two training sessions per week that both run for two hours.

Throughout the year Ruapehu College usually has multiple Squash exchanges with other schools such as Otorohanga College, Palmerston North Boys High School and Taumarunui High School. We also send teams to compete in the New Zealand Secondary School Championships and have had some great success in the past.

In 2026 Ruapehu College made history by sending 20 students that made up three teams(Girls A, Girls B and Boys) to New Zealand Secondary School Nationals and they came away with very impressive results. Our Girls A team claimed 2nd place overall, the Boys team claimed second place in division 2 (18th overall) and our Girls B team came away with 7th overall. Ruapehu College also received the CoEd cup for the first time ever, this is for the best performing CoEd school. The cherry on top was that we also had two players named in the New Zealand Transtasman tournament team who will take on Australia later in the year, Hana Harding claimed the number 2 spot and Jessie Harding non travelling reserve both in the junior girls team, Casey Shields was also very close to being selected.

A massive congratulations to all that were involved. We had a huge support crew travel to Christchurch but an even bigger crew back home who made this trip possible. A huge thank you to everyone that watched via the livestreaming and for all of the awesome messages of support, it meant a lot to all involved and helped our players continue pushing when things got tough.

Bring on 2027!!