Saturday 27th June – Regional Combined Athletics Events
Isla – represented the Year 10 Combined Events Team, Maggie and Lucia represented the Year 9 team.
Saturday 27th June – U13/U15 Cricket v Solihull School
Our final Saturday block cricket fixture took place this week, with 44 girls travelling to Solihull. U13b had a great fixture with all girls contributing with bat or ball and just fell short of their target by 6 runs, the U13a fielding and bowled excellently, restricting Solihull to 100. Although we made it hard work with the bat, we won with 4 wickets to spare. The U15b performed well against a strong side but showed the strength in depth we have at that age group and batted really well again, falling just short of the target. U15a had a tough fixture against a very strong side. It was pleasing to see a much-improved batting performance with girls spending a long time at the crease rather than throwing their wicket away.
Overall, it has been a positive year of cricket with much improvement done.
Monday 29th June – ESSKIA Indoor Champs
After the recent sweltering weather it was a welcome return to the Hemel Snow Centre for the ESSkiA Indoor Championships last Monday. A huge field of nearly 280 racers took to the start gate from all across the UK for the last race of the school year. The seventeen gate slalom course was set for fast times which got even faster as the day wore on and a hard packed racing line formed. Two teams from King’s High competed, with Kitty, Hermione, Carys and Loretta making up the CAT4 (U18) team with Lydia, Darcey and Eliza competing in the CAT3 (U16) team event. A good strong start is always important and the girls had just that with all finishing their first runs with clean, fast times. The start order is reversed for run 2 so conditions can be tricky but as the course got faster all the girls improved on their first run times – with both times combined for the final rankings. Darcey skied brilliantly, two super clean runs put her 3rd on the podium in the CAT2 girls individual race with Loretta just a fraction of a second behind in 5th place. Eliza was steady and consistent and made the top 15, ahead of some girls with much more racing experience. Kitty was in her first indoor race for many months but it didn’t show as she laid down two excellent runs to top the CAT4 girls ranking and take 3rd place overall female. Unfortunately Lydia caught a gate on her second run which dropped her down the rankings although she showed great composure under pressure to finish her run and record a time, keeping her team in the competition. Carys and Hermione, steady as ever were 5th and 6th CAT4 females respectively.
In the team competitions, the CAT4 girls finished on the podium in a strong 3rd place, while the CAT2 girls came 5th. Well done King’s High girls, great racing!
Sunday 28th to Wednesday 1st July – U13 Ralph Cake Trophy, U15 Asbury-Bailey Cup & U18 Loveband Trophy, Eton Tennis Tournament
The U13, U15 and U18 teams travelled to Eton College this week for the ISTA tournament, the highlight of the tennis calendar. Always a fun yet really challenging event, the pairs had some great challenges, testing themselves against some of the biggest Independent schools in the Country, many of which have dedicated tennis academies. They all performed brilliantly and were a real credit to the school. A special mention to our outgoing tennis Captains Maddie and Marina, who faced 2nd seeds Surbiton in the Semi-final. Having lost the first set 0-6 and from 1-4 down in the second set, pulled together a monumental fight back to take the match on a third set tie-break, a phenomenal achievement against a very talented and experienced opposition.
U13
Isabella and Maisie – Cup main draw second stage
Imo and Olivia – Plate semi-finalists
U15
Ava and Mollie – Cup Quarter finalists
Harriet and Jasmine – Cup Quarter finalists
U18
Ellie and Isla – Loveband shield runners up (6th overall)
Maddie and Marina – Loveband Trophy runners up (2nd overall) best ever finish for a King’s High pair.
Wednesday 1st July – Mercia Finals
Honor in year 8 participated in a number of hockey trials over the last couple of months, against over 120 other girls throughout the Midlands and beyond to be selected for the U13 Mercian Marauders squad who will represent the Midlands region in the UK Lions tournament at Nottingham hockey centre in a couple of weeks. The Marauders played some practice games this weekend in extreme heat against both the North East region and Trent Raiders and beat both teams.
Friday 12th June – U12ABCDEF Cricket v Princethorpe
The U12A team had a successful game of hardball cricket winning bu 7 runs. It was several players’ first experience of hardball but they did fantastically.
The U12 D and E teams had an excellent fixture against Princethorpe. With both teams deciding to bat first, it was a strong start for all. Some great tactical batting from Harriet in the D team and Gabrielle in the E team put the teams in a solid position. Both Princethorpe teams put out a good batting effort but it was not quite enough to equal KHS big scores. Special shout out to Daya in the E team for some brilliant bowling. Well done all!
Saturday 13th June – WSAA T&F Champs
Well done to all athletes who competed at the WSAA track and field champs. Some excellent results among some tough competition from all participants. Well done all!
Wednesday 17th June – Year 7&8 District
Both the year 7s and 8s had a strong set of results at the district championships on Wednesday. There were lots of opportunity for various students to try their hand at the different disciplines. A strong team performance from both age groups was clear to see with many top 3 finishers. There were also some strong performances in the field. It was great to see some more of our athletes who attend club sessions weekly being rewarded with the opportunity to perform at competitions. Well done all!
Swimming
Congratulations to Ella who had a great weekend at The City of Birmingham swimming meet and came away with 2 golds, a silver and 3 bronzes across breaststroke, butterfly and IMs. Ella’s current 50m breaststroke time puts her 3rd in England for her age.
Badminton
Congratulations to Hannah who as reported earlier in the year was awarded the Young Leader of the Year award by Badminton England. She was accompanied by our Badminton coaches George and Jane Tarver as well as her family to the National Badminton Centre at Milton Keynes to receive the National Young Leader of the Year Award, the trophy was presented to Hannah by Para Olympic Silver medal winner Krysten Coombes MBE . A remarkable acheievement. Congratulations, Hannah!
Saturday – Sunday 6th & 7th June Midland Ski Club and UNIQ Club Nationals
The summer dry slope ski season is in full swing and Kitty, Loretta and Eliza were competing last weekend on their home slope at Swadlincote in the Midland Ski Club and UNIQ Club National Races.
The biggest races of the season so far attracted over 170 racers each day from across the country. Top class competition as well as changeable weather made for an exciting 2 days of racing. In Saturday’s race, Kitty recovered from a first run disqualification with two strong runs to climb up to 11th overall, just missing out on the U18 podium. Loretta, in her first race of the year had 3 solid runs to finish 5th U14 and Eliza, who’s only been ski racing for a year had a 10th place finish in an extremely competitive U16 category which will greatly improve her national ranking – well doe to all 3 of them!!
With Loretta unavailable, just Kitty and Eliza took to the start on Sunday for the UNIQ Snowsports race which proved to be a tougher test. With lots of non-finishers and disqualifications, it became a race of attrition and sadly Eliza, despite 2 steady runs, missed a gate on her required 3rd run and so was disqualified. Nevertheless, she skied with great assurance all weekend and gained lots of valuable race experience. Kitty managed to battle on and despite finishing lower than the previous day in 13th overall position she made the podium placings with a 3rd U18.
A fantastic weekend of racing with more to come during the summer months.
Tuesday 9th June – U12 Tennis v Princethorpe
6 pairs of U12 tennis players headed to Princethorpe for a friendly fixture, the first fixture for many of the team. It was a great match-up and lots of good games played by all, and lots of learning done about competitive match-play. Well done to all the players who took part.
Wednesday 10th June – U14 Tennis v Princethorpe
It was the turn of the U14 team on Wednesday to take to the court against Princethorpe, in-between dodging the apocalyptic showers, some great tennis played by all and a lovely opportunity to play some more competitive tennis.
Badminton
On Friday 22 May, we welcomed another visit from international badminton players Greg and Jenny Mairs. During the evening, they presented the Mid Warwickshire Badminton Coaching Young Leader of the Year Trophy to Hannah. In June, Hannah will attend the National Badminton Centre to receive her National Young Leader Award. She has also enrolled to take the Foundation Coaching Award in September. Congratulations, Hannah, on these fantastic achievements!
Equestrian
Our Equestrian Team recently competed at Hickstead in the prestigious National Schools Jumping Finals, achieving some excellent results across the competition. Despite the challenging hot weather, our riders and horses performed exceptionally well.
Competing in showjumping, dressage and the Eventer Challenge, the team secured an impressive 5th place nationally in the Eventer Challenge (70–75cm). Amy, in Year 8, also delivered a fantastic performance, finishing 6th in her showjumping class.Congratulations to all the girls for representing the school with such skill.
Mila has qualified her pony Sparky for horse of the year show coming 2nd. Mila has 2 more ponies to qualify and 4 more opportunities so she is working hard trying to make it all happen.
Arabella came 9th in the juniors 2*L at bicton horse trials with her horse Rooster who only came out of major surgery 11 weeks ago.
