GDST Athletics Champions 2022!

On Monday 13 June, the Year 6 – 12 athletics teams departed from school at 5.30am, whilst most of our friends were still fast asleep! We were all eager and excited for the day of athletics that we had ahead of us. After a 3.5 hour journey (mostly spent eating breakfast and chatting with our teammates) we arrived at The Harvey Hadden Stadium in Nottingham.

We were handed our numbers and athletics vests and we stepped off the coach, the fresh air of the morning enlivening us all! We set up a base; a perfect spot from where we could view the entirety of the track. As the competition got underway, we quickly realised that we definitely had the loudest supporters, with teachers from other schools even stating that ‘we had the best fanclub’!

Many of us were really pleased as we achieved personal bests or school records and all of us had performances to be proud of. We did brilliantly in all of the events, both track and field, with top 3 finishes in the majority of them. There were finals for the hurdles, 80m (for year 6), 100m, 200m, 300m (for the year 10 and above age group) and the 4x100m relays. Croydon High qualified for every final, which was a great achievement in itself.

The finals were incredibly exciting races to watch and our entire team gave their best. The results came next; we were so happy to hear that we were announced as overall GDST Athletics Champions 2022, with individual victories in the Year 6, 7 and 8 age groups, joint victory in Year 9 and a close second place finish, by two points, in Year 10+. Despite being a long day, the rally was an amazing experience and I look forward to competing again next year.

By Isy P 8F