U21 Paddle Ferns coaches take cutting-edge Kiwi tech to World Champs.

"To be able to support a team of incredible young women in any way is awesome."

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New Zealand’s Under-21 Women’s Canoe Polo squad is heading to the World Championships with Kiwi-built AI technology that could change how top teams coach.

When you're standing on a pontoon in a lake, a laptop isn’t a realistic option. Neither is a pen and paper. For the coaching staff of the U21 Paddle Ferns, that practical reality made Contented the perfect tool.

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Founded in Ōtautahi Christchurch by Lucy Pink and Hannah Hardy-Jones, Contented is a conversational intelligence platform that records meetings anywhere - including on the water - and turns them into polished documents, actions, charts, and insights. 

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The team's assistant coach, Bede Skinner-Vennell, is a software engineer who first picked up Contented at work, and has since brought it to the canoe polo coaching setup. It’s changed how the U21 Paddle Ferns prepare, train, and share feedback.

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Coaching canoe polo - like many high performance sports - means analysing every moment. It’s a game of 10-minute halves, and looking down to scribble a note means missing something else. Skinner-Vennell and head coach Kate Blincoe don’t miss anything - they clip on a microphone, hit record with the Contented mobile app, and capture every second.

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“Being able to just talk means you can continue watching the game and you don't miss anything,” Skinner-Vennell says. “A lot can happen in a short game of canoe polo. If you’re looking down writing something for 30 seconds, it's a big chunk of the game.”

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Contented is built for noisy spaces, and it filters out sideline cheering, meaning Skinner-Vennell and Blincoe have a complete reference of the match, with a level of detail not possible before. Contented means small observations - a paddle stroke that needs adjusting, a positioning habit in attack - the kinds of things a coach notices but wouldn’t stop to write down, are now part of the record.

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Skinner-Vennell uses a Contented shortcut to output the results in a structured table with what the team needs to work on, as well as individual notes for players. 

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“We're able to give them way, way better feedback with Contented,” Skinner-Vennell said. “It’s not just the macro team stuff. We’re able to give players individual feedback and specifics on what to work on.”

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The team has been using Contented for about six months, and the two organisations have partnered ahead of the 2026 Canoe Polo World Championships in Duisburg, Germany. 

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“We can’t wait to see these talented athletes on the world stage,” says Contented co-founder Hannah Hardy-Jones. “To be able to support a team of incredible young women in any way is awesome. 

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“When we built Contented we knew that amazing conversations happen in all kinds of places, and out on the water is another epic use case. It’s a literal game changer for coaches to be able to focus on the match, not the note-taking.”

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The tool is being tested by a number of sports organisations around the country. Its ability to record anywhere, and free up coaches to be entirely present with players, could change how coaching administration is handled.

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The U21 Paddle Ferns will be battling it out from September 15 to 20 at the World Championships in Duisburg, Germany. 

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“We can’t wait to see these talented athletes on the world stage," says Contented co-founder Hannah Hardy-Jones. "To be able to support a team of incredible young women in any way is awesome."

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"When we built Contented we knew that amazing conversations happen in all kinds of places, and out on the water is another epic use case. It’s a literal game changer for coaches to be able to focus on the match, not the note-taking."

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The U21 Paddle Ferns will be battling it out from September 15 to 20 at the World Championships in Duisburg, Germany. Go team!

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