KING’S BIRTHDAY HONOURS
Beatrice Faumuina CNZM, ONZM, was made a Companion of the New Zealand Order of Merit for services to sport and governance
Beatrice a former athlete, having won 21 New Zealand senior titles (17 discus throw and 4 shot put), and has held governance roles in sport and business, and has worked in international relations.
From 2015 to 2018 she was the New Zealand Trade Commissioner and Consul General in New York, and was a member of the New Zealand and Samoa Trade Investment Commission. She has held many national governance roles, including as a Trustee of the Spark Foundation, a member of the Women in Sport Aotearoa Steering Committee and a member of the Westpac Sustainability Expert Advisory Panel. She was Deputy Chair of The Trusts Area from 2021 to 2024, and helped coordinate assistance provided to families evacuated to the Arena during the 2023 Auckland Anniversary Floods. Over her athletics career, she represented New Zealand at four Olympics Games, five Commonwealth Games, and six World Athletics Championships, winning the gold medal in the discus at the 1997 Athens world championships. She was a member of the Athletes’ Commissions for the International Association of Athletics Federations, and the New Zealand Olympic Committee. She served two terms as Director of Sport New Zealand, where she helped shape High Performance Sport New Zealand’s design of wellbeing initiatives to manage athlete mental health. She was co-host of ‘Straight Up with Niva and Beatrice Faumuinā’, which was a finalist for best original podcast at the 2023 Voyager Awards. She was made an Officer of the New Zealand Order of Merit in 2005 and was inducted into the New Zealand Sports Hall of Fame in 2019.
Barbara Beable MNZM was made a Member of the New Zealand Order of Merit for services to athletics.
Barbara Beable (née Poulsen) has contributed more than 60 years to sport and athletics as an athlete, coach, and educator.
She won 17 senior individual New Zealand Championship titles between 1966 and 1978, including nine in the pentathlon and eight in shot put. She represented New Zealand at three Commonwealth Games, winning silver in the shot put in the 1970 Edinburgh Games. Her highest international ranking for pentathlon was fourth. She worked with her husband, Dr Michael Beable to create a unique training environment that saw many reach national and international success. As Head of Physical Education for 26 years at Queen Margaret College Wellington, she introduced modern fitness programmes that underpinned the sports and recreational programmes, and was a member of the pilot group that pioneered Physical Education as an academic subject. Alongside Dame Lois Muir and the Capital Shakers Netball team in the early 2000s, she worked as the strength and conditioning coach, introducing the players to techniques and processes that now form the basis of modern training programmes. Many of those players later became Silver Ferns, including some who still coach today. Since retiring to Wānaka in 2016, she has continued to coach at the Aspiring Athletics Club while endeavouring to raise funds to further develop facilities for the youth of Wānaka.
Dr Michael Beable MNZM was made a Member of the New Zealand Order of Merit for services to athletics.
Michael has contributed more than 50 years to athletics as an athlete and a coach.
As a self-taught athlete, he held the Wellington long jump record for 16 years and was selected twice for New Zealand international teams. He began formal coaching in 1974, in partnership with his wife, Mrs Barbara Beable. He has coached athletes to 133 national titles at New Zealand Open and Secondary School level. 55 have represented New Zealand, with some competing at Olympic and Commonwealth Games and World Championships. He held national coaching roles, including Head Coach for the 1981 New Zealand team to the Pre-Commonwealth Games International Meeting in Brisbane, and Auxiliary Coach at the 1990 Auckland Games. Between 1977 and 1983 he served on the Athletics New Zealand National Coaching Committee, where he helped shape coaching nationally with the production of the Athletics New Zealand Coaching Manual, from which the junior athletics’ Run-Jump-Throws programme was derived. He led development of the national coaching structure and Coaches Diploma. He continues to coach both school athletes with the Aspiring Athletics Club and high-performing senior athletes, including Shay Veitch, the current and four-time national New Zealand long jump champion. In 2022, Michael was awarded Athletics New Zealand’s highest coaching honour, the Arthur Eustace Award for Coaching.
Trevor Spittle MNZM was made a Member of the New Zealand Order of Merit for services to athletics.
Trevor has volunteered as an athletics official, administrator and educator for more than 40 years.
He initially volunteered at the former QEII Stadium in Christchurch in the early 1980s, quickly progressing from timekeeper to meeting manager. His commitment to athletics and its development locally, nationally and internationally has seen him volunteer thousands of hours in various key positions. He was President of the Canterbury Athletics Centre, President of Athletics New Zealand, and Committee Member of the ANZ Officials Association. He qualified as a World Athletics International Technical Official in 2005, and has supported five Commonwealth Games, eight World Athletics Championships, three Paralympic Games, six World Para Athletics Championships, the Sydney and Tokyo Olympics, and Singapore and Buenos Aires Youth Olympics. As a member of the World Athletics Competition Commission, he advised the World Athletics Council on the development of athletic events worldwide from 2015 to 2023. He played a crucial role in establishing an interim athletics facility at Rāwhiti Domain after the Canterbury earthquakes, as well as the development of the new track at Ngā Puna Wai. As a World Athletics technical official lecturer, he continues to support the development of aspiring technical officials across New Zealand and the Pacific. He has been a member of the Oceania Athletics Association Council since 2007.