Sport St Mary’s Enjoy Team League, Cup and Individual Honours in 2019/20

St Mary’s University, Twickenham sport teams and athletes enjoyed a hugely successful year in 2019/20.

Prior to the Sport St Mary’s Department closing its doors because of the pandemic, the student teams had celebrated ten league wins with four teams going unbeaten, four cup successes and a number of podium places being achieved by its sport scholars and student athletes from the Endurance Performance Centre (EPC).

The men’s Rugby League team won the British Universities and Colleges Sport (BUCS) Premier South without losing a game. Whilst the Netball 1^st team and men’s Rugby Union 2^nd XV were also unbeaten as they secured league and cup doubles.

The women’s and men’s Futsal teams won their respective leagues while the Football 1^st team (women) and Football 2^nd team (men) achieved the same milestone. The women’s Rugby Union 1^st XV, Golf and men’s Badminton team completed the honours board with further league wins.

Sport St Mary’s sport scholars on the EPC produced some excellent wins and personal best times. Denmark’s Anna Moller won the long race at the BUCS Cross Country for the second year, the European U23 5000m and retained her European U23 cross country title. Anna was also nominated for three European Athlete of the month awards including a win in July 2019. Izzy Fry gained her first GB selection coming fourth in the 5000m at the European Athletics U20 Champs and was second in the BUCS Cross Country and the English National Champs. The women’s team placed second at the BUCS Cross Country, a place higher than the previous year.

Other notable successes at the BUCS Cross Country included top ten finishes for Dan Jarvis and Abdul Sharif to ensure that the men’s team won the long race title for the fourth successive year, and St Mary’s provided the individual winner of the short course for the sixth year with Joe Wigfield finishing first and Alex Ediker in second place. Jo Wigfield also made his GB debut competing in the 3000m at the European Athletics U20 Champs.

Further notable achievements have included Becky Briggs breaking her own British U20 half-marathon record and Abi Burton, Emma Uren and Ellie Kildunne being named in the extended sevens squad for the Tokyo Olympics. Shemar Boldizsar had an excellent year winning the 200m at the European Athletics U23 Champs, finishing third at the British Indoor Championships and third at the BUCS Indoor Champs.

Another landmark for Sport St Mary’s was reached this year with three students forming 10% of the national intake into the BUCS Student Leadership programme and another student being included onto the BUCS Women’s leadership Programme.

Andrew Reid-Smith Head of Sport St Mary’s said “We’ve achieved some outstanding results and I’d like to congratulate all the teams and athletes and thank all the coaches for their incredibly hard work.

St Mary’s is renowned for its student sport and Sport St Mary’s and the Students’ Union work in partnership to provide a high-quality programme that our students can enjoy and benefit from.”

“While the results on the field and the track have been excellent we also work with our sports scholars and teams to put something back off the playing field and our Rugby League team raised £1,500 for CALM during a 24h row and the Men’s football team achieved a Guinness World Record for the longest ever game of ‘One Bounce’. They played for over four hours.”

“We’re currently providing advice and support where we can for our sport scholars and student clubs during the current lockdown and helping them prepare for future team and individual competitions.”

Are you looking to join us in September 2020? Students can still access a huge range of high-quality support through our renowned Endurance Performance Centre and Sport Scholarship programmes which support over 150 high performing students every year. For more information contact Sport Development Manager, Gareth Crewe (gareth.crewe@stmarys.ac.uk).