As Summer made its welcome appearance schools athletics action also hotted up down at the sports field for both Junior and Senior Sports Day (Tuesday 20 June and Thursday 6 July)
Junior Sports Day was full of impressive athleticism and team spirit on show from girls across the school. The addition of new long distance events and a refined variety of circuit stations combined to make for a challenging but fun day for everyone involved. Congratulations go to everyone in Gurney for contributing to winning the Junior Sports Day Cup in an impressive victory.
A week later as temperatures soared again Senior School field and track records tumbled – some of them dating back more than 10 years.
No less than eight school records were broken by girls from year 7 to year 10 in a sports day which saw athletes exceeding their expectations plus wonderful House spirit and true collaboration.
In the field, both the year 7 and year 9 javelin records fell. For year 7, Georgina Budden’s throw of 21.25m surpassed the 2010 record of 20.05m, while Maria Torren Peraire took apart the year 9 record with a throw of 22.84m, the previous record of 21.01m having been set in 2014.
It was also a good day for the year 9 long jump with Sophie Harris smashing the record by some way with a jump of 4.75m; the old record of 4.45m has stood since 2005. Later in the day she also broke the year 9 hurdles record in a time of 8.69 seconds (previous time of 8.92s set in 2014).
Also on the track, Grace Fullerton effortlessly broke the year 10 hurdles record with a time of 8.70 seconds. In long distance running Tilly Stevens-Cox easily broke the year 8 1500m record from 2016 with a time of 5 minutes 38 seconds (old record: 5 minutes 43 seconds). Meanwhile Eleanor Osmond stormed past the 17-year old year 9 record for the same distance with a time of 5 minutes 25 seconds (old record:5 minutes 46 seconds). When it came to the 800 metres India Adams swept aside the 2006 year 8 time for the 800m with a run of 2 minutes 37 seconds (old record 2 minutes 42 seconds in 2006).
As well as the usual field and track events, three additional sports took place: Boccia, Target throwing and Tug of War There was also a hotly contested Tug of War which was won by Stanley for year s 7 8 & 9 and by Grey for year 10 and year 12. For some the highlight of the day was the closely fought House cheerleading competition with plenty of lifts, flips and slick dance moves employed to win over the judges. This was narrowly won by Shirreff.
The scores for the many events and heats were expertly kept by a team led by year 11 student Annabelle Simmonds, who had created a computer programme specifically to manage all the data.
With all the points added up, the Sports Day Cup went to Grey – the first time that Grey House has lifted the trophy for some years.
The Victrix Ludorum shield was awarded to Sophie Harris for her overall performance across the day.
Meanwhile Junior Sports
