Category: Woodbridge News
Ten athletes from Years 6 – 8 travelled to Birmingham to compete in the National Prep Schools’ Athletics Championships, after gaining 1st or 2nd place at the Regional round at Bedford in June. To have ten athletes from one school representing the East team is a phenomenal achievement!
Better still, three of our athletes gained podium positions – truly phenomenal achievements: Fazil Akyol won the U13 High Jump with an amazing jump of 1.54m; Beau Barrington-Hibbert became the U13 discus champion with a huge throw of 25.85m; and Henry Dinwiddy showed extraordinary determination on the track to gain a bronze medal and third place in the 800m.
Close behind them, but not quite on the podium this year, Lexi Barrington-Hibbert and Tom Mitchell were both called up to represent the East team in the discus, and for their first major competition they performed exceptionally well against some tough competition; Tom Martin managed to secure a distance in his last throw in the javelin, but he was unlucky not to be called up for a 4th throw in the top 8 of the competition; and the U13 Relay team of Ada Marson, Maddie Buchanan, Libbie Brightey and Ruby Vinton ran a good race with slick changeovers, but unfortunately they were just outside of the qualifying time for the finals.
Many, many congratulations to all the athletes: they performed brilliantly on what was a fiercely hot day. Thank you also to Mr Graham and Mr Goddard for their coaching in preparation for the event and on the day, and to all the parents who came to support. Roll on next year!
Congratulations to Oliver Juszt who has just returned from completing a series win over Germany this weekend, playing for the England U18 Hockey team, this all despite still being an under sixteen! Indeed it was his string of exceptional performances as the number 1 shirt for the England U16 team over the season (against The Netherlands, Spain and Ireland to name but a few) that earned him this very unusual and prestigious call up to the more senior squad.
Next up for Oliver is a Test series with the England U16 team against Belgium, and the summer Six Nations event. We wish him the best of luck and great success in his career as an England international over the course of this summer and beyond.
Twenty five cyclists on the road, 92 miles each (give or take). If it were a relay that would be Land’s End to John o’ Groats, and back again, and then over to Woodbridge for good measure! Now there’s a thought….
What a day it was. Glorious sunshine and a gentle breeze; clear roads (mostly!) and cheerful fellow road users (mostly!!); only one puncture (a record – these things matter); and a peloton which bonded as well as any I can remember over the 21 rides. We stuck together for the morning, reached lunch in a pack (a packed lunch), and arrived home to a cascade of applause all within an hour of each other! And the last ones (Mr Garvie and I – tradition you understand… nothing to do with my creaking knees) were tucking into their first restorative tipple well before 5pm to set a new twenty-first century record by the best part of an hour.
Amazing.
You should have been there.
These people were there: our astonishingly spritely pupils: Tom Benoist Wilson, Toby Cassy, Charlie Eaton, Dom Ellice-Freeman, Ali Lloyd, Tom Scoggins and Oliver Wroe (completing in extremely fine style his fourth in a row to join a very select band of pupils to have done all four possible while at school). Hats (and helmets) off to the lot of them – brilliant cycling and outstanding fund raising. Alongside them on the road (though usually behind them!) OWs George Cory, Ben and Lucy Havard, Adam Hedley, Ben Hoyer and David Spray; parents and friends Andrew, Ceri, Paul, Jude and Toby; and staff Mr Garvie (the incredible and ever-present), Miss George, Mrs Mitchell, Mr Morcombe, Miss Richardson, Dr Rickard and me on two wheels, and Mr Bruce, Mr Jackson and Mr and Mrs Hillman on four. And waiting for us all at lunch in the car park at Colne Engaine with the finest collection of hot drinks imaginable the utterly wonderful double act of Mrs Spray and Mrs Streat.
But I must mention the night before!! You see the event starts with the journey to London once Mr Hillman has done his annual tetris challenge of securing the bikes on parent of OWs Mr Foskett’s glorious trailer. Dinner at The Horseshoe, Clerkenwell – fabulous – thank you Rob Madigan and team: your hospitality and generosity is utterly wonderful; heartfelt speeches and delightful further hospitality (including a fine breakfast) from head teacher Penny Barratt and Adi Cimic representing The Bridge School; and then before you know it we are off at 7am on Saturday morning.
And the rest is history.
Please, please, please if you have read this far (it’s taken you less time than the ride…), now is the time to add your donation to the cause. The Bridge School needs and treasures our support. Our fundraising has made a direct and hugely positive difference to the lives of its wonderful children. We are only 25 riders but we want to raise £10,000 which means £400 each which is difficult, but we’re already half way there…so your contribution really, really matters: pick one of us:
https://www.justgiving.com/teams/spinforthebridge2018
Or pick me!!: https://www.justgiving.com/fundraising/michael-streat7
James Phelan (Year 12) has been named as one of fifteen winners in the Peterhouse Vellacott Essay Competition, one of the most prestigious national essay competitions open to Year 12 pupils. James chose to pursue his love of the Ancient World by writing an extremely well-researched and scholarly essay – ‘Should we be more surprised by the decline or the longevity of the Byzantine Empire?’
215 pupils entered from across Britain and James is to be congratulated upon his fantastic achievement. He will collect his prize of £75 at an awards ceremony at Peterhouse, Cambridge on Friday 22 June.
The Fitzgerald Society is Woodbridge School’s new Junior Oxbridge Programme, aimed at intellectual high fliers in Years 10-11 with a zest of knowledge and exploration. Pupils interested may not even be looking to end up at Oxford or Cambridge, but will love thinking and tackling challenging ideas.
There will be a mixture of events and subsidiary activities, starting in Michaelmas 2018 with a trip to the British Museum to explore how power and authority can be conveyed through images, rather than words. Other major events will include a moot (mock law trial) where you will study evidence, create your own cases, and bring them to court. There will also be a trip to either Bawdsey Radar exhibition or Bletchley Par. Pupils will also have the opportunity to take part in the Alan Turing Cryptography competition run by Manchester University.
Subsidiary activities will include exploring the use of arsenic in the Victorian era, and logic problems set by GCHQ.
For more information about how to apply please contact Miss Anne Wright in the Classics Department.
Our Young Enterprise team, East Coast Eats, have sold over 300 copies of their magnificent cookery book and, on the way, being a fine example of a young business, have turned a very healthy profit. Moreover, they have persuaded no fewer than seven retailers to stock their cookery books, designed with those taking self-catering holidays in mind. And if you have somehow missed the chance to purchase a copy for yourself in your local browsing, they even have a few copies available for sale direct! Perhaps most importantly the students have been on a journey of self-discovery. They have learned to run a business make decisions and take risks. This has taught them innumerable lessons and has given them life skills, and, of course, made them very much more employable – and their forthcoming university applications all the more impressive!
But Young Enterprise is also a competition (https://www.youtube.com/user/YoungEnterpriseUK), and the team recently competed at the regional final having won the Suffolk final. They performed magnificently, winning the trade stand and business interview with margin to spare, and presenting to the audience with flair, humour and amazing poise. Sadly, though, only one team could go forward to the national Final and, by a whisker, East Coast Eats finished as runners up. Although disappointed, our sixth formers took the news with great character, strength and good grace. After all, they have left a legacy which will sit proudly on bookshelves across East Anglia for many years to come. Mrs Wright, our head of enterprise said, “It has been an honour to work with such a fantastic group of young people this year. East Coast Eats set a fantastically high standard, and can be immensely proud to have been the region’s best selling and most profitable company this year.” And the pupils? Jude Ashken, Mollie Biddle, Jessica Bowers, Joshua Bradbeer, Saxon Gallo, Mary Godfrey, Thea Hall, Daniel Hempstead, Ella Holliday, Sebastian Lamb, Nathan Little, Georgia Martin, Lily Proudfoot and Callum Sycamore.
Pupils from Year 9SV and Year 10 Latin entered the Cambridge Ancient Worlds Video Competition, which required them to produce a short video inspired by the Ancient World. Nine videos were selected by the judges, and three of these were Woodbridge entries. No other school in the history of the competition has had so high a proportion of successful videos in one year. Enormous congratulations to:
Aimen Alvi, Sophie Harper, Maisie Watts and Charlotte Dinwiddy, who came 4th with their beautiful rendition of the story of Orpheus and Eurydice, Harry Rennell, who produced a very clever and witty take on the real truth about the Cyclops Polyphemus, and Medomfo Owusu, Ianthe Hill and Lily Peto, who produced a charming and delicate shadow-puppet version of the story of Prometheus.
On Friday 8 June, Bedford and the East Area Prep Schools’ Athletics Championships was the venue of choice for those of our pupils who had gained this season’s qualifying times and distances. With 51 schools present, every event was highly competitive making finishing in the top two to qualify for the Nationals in Birmingham quite a challenge.
First to compete for the senior school was Ruby Vinton in the 1500m. She set a new record by 3 seconds running in 4:54.8 and was way in front of the rest of the field from the start! Woodbridge now hold the best two times in the history of the event, as April Hill set the previous record two years ago. Henry Dinwiddy also qualified in the 800m finishing second in his race. Fazil Akyol did well to get to the finals of the 200m, but found rushing from the high jump competition to the 200m final and back to high jump was one obstacle too much. However he was delighted to win the high jump with a clearance of 1.50m. He also made the relay final with fellow team mates Ronald Hui, Tommy Burrows and Ebuke Ofunne. Tom Martin threw the javelin 31.09m to win his competition; and with the last field event of the day Beau Barrington-Hibbert threw the discus a magnificent 28.30m to set another new record, eclipsing OW Katie La Vergne’s mark held for the past seven years. Moments later, at 6.10pm, the girls’ relay team of Ruby Vinton, Maddie Buchanan, Libbie Brightey and Ada Marson sealed another second place, and qualification for Birmingham.
Those who narrowly missed out in 3rd place were Lexie Barrington-Hibbert, Tom Mitchell and Henry Dinwiddy in discus and Katie Norman in javelin. These amazing results are testimony to our athletes’ hard work and dedicated training under the expert guidance of coaches Mr Graham and Mr Goddard. Two new records set and a trip to the Nationals on the 3rd July in prospect! Our thanks also go to Mr Wheelhouse and Miss Sanders who were busy officiating all day.
On Wednesday night during Half Term some of our top athletes travelled to Watford to compete in a series of middle distance races in the hope of achieving personal bests or perhaps even the entry standard for England Schools.
Alex Evans Lombe was the only athlete to compete at 3000m, having finished second at the recent Suffolk Schools running 9:57 to secure selection to compete at the Anglian schools on 16th June. This time Alex improved by a massive 25 seconds, running 9:32 and gaining a perfect confidence boost ahead of the Anglians.
Amy Goddard and Kit Evans Lombe competed at 1500m and ran brilliantly, just missing out on season bests by one and two seconds respectively.
Charlie Turner had opened his season with a 4:36 PB, and on Wednesday he went significantly faster running a really impressive 4:27. Charlie is in Year 9 – the Year 13 school sports day record (set in 1974) is 4:29!
April Hill entered this event with a personal best of 4:52 knowing that she needed 4:48 to be included in the top 25 or 30 athletes that will get to start in one of two heats at England Schools. The result – April ran a new personal best of exactly 4:48, qualifying for England Schools and as far as we are aware becomes the first female Woodbridge School endurance athlete to do so.
Last but not least, Nathan Goddard started his race with a personal best of 4:10 knowing he needed 4:06 to guarantee selection. Not only did he achieve that, he ran quicker than the National Standard of 4:03 for his age, recording a very swift 4:02.79. This will secure Nathan’s passage to compete at England Schools in Birmingham on 13-14 July for the third year in succession.
To give the performance some context, Nathan is age 15 in Year 11… now, what did I write above about Year 13 school record…?!
A long night in Watford, but a very successful trip and we wish the athletes the very best for the rest of the season.
This has been an outstanding first Senior School winter for young Ruby Vinton who was competing a year up in Club and Inter County events as an under 13. Ruby was ranked 6th in the UK after a winter in the mud, which is the second highest ranking by any Suffolk athlete, and she is one of only three Suffolk Juniors to make the rankings across the ages. Ruby’s impressive season included a win at the National England Schools’ Cup, victories at the South of England Inter Counties and South of England individual events, and a fantastic 8th at the UK inter Counties.
Not only is Ruby competing a year up, she is an August birthday in Year 7! What a winter; all being well Ruby has an exciting few years ahead.