Mark Skimming, head swimming coach at the University of Bath, is used to helping students and athletes reach their peak physical condition. But this year he has also been training for his own monumental challenge - trekking 6,000m to Everest base camp to raise funds for the hospital that saved his young son. Albert, now three, was born 13 weeks early and spent his first three months in intensive care after been diagnosed with chronic lung disease. He has...
Rio-bound pentathlete Joe Choong says he would "really recommend the University of Bath to all student-athletes" after successfully managing the demands of his academic and sporting careers to achieve Olympic Games selection. The Pentathlon GB athlete will become the latest in a long line of University of Bath students to compete at a Games when he heads to Rio 2016 next month. The first was David Hembrow back in 1968, the Statistics student and swimmer narrowly missing out on a 4x100m medley relay...
The academic year may be over but there is no let-up in the sporting action at the University of Bath, with the Sports Training Village playing host to thousands of athletes of all ages during a busy July. This week’s big event is the 19th Team Bath CoMpete Open Tennis Festival, taking place on the indoor and outdoor courts every day until Saturday, July 23. Hundreds of tennis players from around the country are competing...
Emerging Pentathlon GB athletes Francesca Summers and Myles Pillage will get to experience the Olympic environment this summer after being selected on the Ambition Programme for the Rio 2016 Olympic Games. The teenage duo, along with Pathways Manager Stuart Mason, will travel to Brazil next month and visit the world-class facilities of Team GB’s preparation camp in Belo Horizonte before flying down to Rio to visit the Olympic Village, British School and British House. They...
University of Bath graduate Joanna Muir was the top performing Pentathlon GB athlete in the individual competitions at the Modern Pentathlon European Championships in Sofia, Bulgaria. Muir, who studied Sports Performance, impressed across all five disciplines on her European debut to finish fifth overall in the women’s final. Fellow graduates Kate French and Samantha Murray – who are preparing for the Rio 2016 Olympic Games – finished tenth and 17th respectively, meaning the British trio...
The world class facilities at the Sports Training Village today welcomed the South West's top young sporting talent as part of Sport England's School Games Festival. School pupils from Bristol, Bath and North East Somerset, North Somerset and South Gloucester who had qualified through previous competitions took part in the regional event, which was organised by the West of England Sports Trust (Wesport). The event was opened by London 2012 shooter Georgina Geikie - the...
Jamie Cooke and University of Bath student Joe Choong narrowly missed out on a medal at Modern Pentathlon European Championships in their final competitive outing before the Rio 2016 Olympic Games. The Pentathlon GB duo finished fourth in the men’s relay in Sofia, Bulgaria on Tuesday, just one second behind the bronze-medallists from Poland. Russia and the Czech Republic took gold and silver respectively after a thrilling combined run/shoot. Cooke and Choong’s combined 200m freestyle...
Pentathlon GB’s four Rio-bound athletes will continue their build-up to the Olympic Games by competing at the European Championships in Sofia, Bulgaria this week. London 2012 silver-medallist Samantha Murray and Kate French are joined in the women’s squad by fellow University of Bath graduate Joanna Muir and current Sociology student Georgia Pipes. Jamie Cooke and Mathematics student Joe Choong, an Ivor Powell Sports Scholar and Dual Career athlete, will contest the men’s individual competition along...
Qualifying for an Olympic Games is unquestionably an outstanding achievement. Only a handful of the world’s most talented athletes will ever have the privilege of representing their country at the biggest sporting event on the planet. So to do so while being in the middle of a full-time University degree course is an almost incomprehensible accomplishment. But that’s exactly what modern pentathlete Joe Choong accomplished after the University of Bath Mathematics student was announced in the Pentathlon...
Nearly 2,000 people of all ages got into the Rio spirit on Saturday when they enjoyed a wide range of sports and activities during an Olympic-themed Family Fun Day at the University of Bath Sports Training Village. Free have-a-go sessions in athletics, badminton, fencing, martial arts, tennis and trampolining proved to be massively popular, as did the chance to experience life as a performance athlete through health and speed testing. Children collected stars as they...
