This month’s performance of the month goes to Lucas Rowe who fought for Great Britain in the Northern Ireland U20 and Senior Open. Lucas won the Junior category of his U60kg weight class, beating the European Youth Olympic Silver medallist, as well as the British Number 1 by a maximum score.
He also took victory in the Senior category, which meant that he moved up to equal first in the British rankings.
Lucas also competed for Great Britain in the last week of April at the Italian Under 20 European Cup, but was disappointed to be knocked out of the tournament by the eventual bronze medallist from Belgium. However, he will travel to Lithuania this weekend (5-6th May) to compete in the Under 20 European Championships, and will be looking to produce a good performance.
Athletics
UoB Athletics Scholars have been taking to the track Stateside, and performing well against their American counterparts. Freshers Pippa Woolven (SportEx) and Iona Lake (Biology) were part of the group of athletes who took part in the UoBAC Ivy League Tour, visiting Harvard, Yale, Penn and Cornell over 3 weeks. At the George Davis International in Lowell, Pippa ran a PB of 9.56 in the 3000m, while Iona also beat her best ever time, finishing in 10.10. Iona got her revenge at the Cornell Tri-Meet, where once again both girls ran personal bests with Iona finishing just ahead of Pippa in the 1500m, recording 4:33 to Pippa’s 4:34.
After spending much of Easter at altitude in Kenya, Jonny Hay (1st Year Chemistry) also made the trip across the Atlantic for the high profile Payton-Jordan Invitational at Stanford, California. On his first outdoor race of the season, Jonny came within 2 seconds of his personal best in the 5000m race, finishing in 13.59.
Cycling
It was another great month for Ciara Horne (2nd Year physiotherapy) who is proving an unstoppable force in BUCS cycling this year. At the BUCS 10 Mile Time Trial held in Cambridge on 21st April conditions were poor during the race, leading to slow times for the whole field. Despite the elements Ciara crossed the line in 23.59 to take the gold, and was ably assisted to team silver by TASS scholar Lara Nyman (2nd Year Natural Sciences), who performed well to finish 9th. On the 28th April the cyclists were in action again at the 25 Mile Time Trial; Ciara finished 1st while smashing her PB by three minutes, and her time combined with that of team mate Carola Westermeier secured the team gold.
Rugby
The main rugby season may be over but UoB Rugby scholars have been keeping busy in April. Garnet MacKinder (3rd Year SPECS) was part of the women’s team which took the title at the BU CS Regional Rugby 7s Championships, beating Cambridge, Bedford and Northampton on the way to qualifying easily for the finals in May.
The men’s team equalled the women’s result, winning their regional qualifier to progress to the national finals, as fresher Fred Gulliford (Political Economy) scored 3 tries over the team’s 4 matches.
Netball
Ellie Townsend (1st year SportEx) was part of the successful UoB Netball side that beat Edinburgh in their first Premier League play-off 57-29, putting them through to the last round of the play offs his week, and giving them a good shot at promotion.