This Spring Term has seen the completion of yet again, another successful Sports Week at St James!

Bad weather and a busy schedule slowed our efforts to get everything completed within a week, but we think all the pupils have had a fantastic time!

We were lucky to be joined by two inspiring speakers: Rachel Pavlou, FA Women’s Development Manager, and Gemma Frizelle, Welsh rhythmic gymnast, who won the individual hoop event at the 2022 Commonwealth Games. They shared their personal and professional journeys as well as great insight into their respective sport, and we were also lucky to have Gemma lead a rythmic gymnastic session with some of our pupils.

Year 7 completed a trip to West Way Climbing Centre. There, they harnessed up and challenged themselves to take on the heights. Working in small groups, they were taught how to strap themselves safely to their harness and how to belay for their partner up the wall. The trip was clearly a success, with several pupils returning to PE the following week asking if we were off climbing again!

Year 8 made a day trip down to Surrey Sports Park to use their state-of-the-art facilities: it’s home of the Woking Football team, training ground for the Harlequins Rugby side and has hosted events like the Women’s Rugby World Cup and Lacrosse World Cup. Pupils rotated between three sports – Squash, Basketball and Climbing/Bouldering. Each event was run by professional coaches, giving pupils a glimpse into a host of sports that we otherwise don’t have the chance to do during our usual curriculum.

Wet weather ran havoc on Year 9 during Sports Week, but we finally managed to get everyone to Rocks Lane in Chiswick where pupils were introduced to padel. The group was split into two- coaching in small groups of four and doubles match play. After raining on our parade, the weather finally showed some signs of spring throughout the morning!

Year 10 had a great time trying their hand at golf! Taking them off to the driving range to tee off and test their skills, they split a bucket of balls and worked on their technique with an amazing coach.

In amongst all of this, was another superb running of our House Lacrosse Competition, which saw St Helena win the overall 1st place!

Sports Week is a regular fixture on the St James calendar and helps pupils try a discipline they’ve never done before as well as have some fun with their classmates outside of the normal school environment. We hope it helps them discover a life long love relationship with sport!