There was to be no medal for University of Bath-based modern penathletes on this occasion but there were still plenty of positives to take from the Rio 2016 Olympic Games for Pentathlon GB. Kate French and Samantha Murray both overcame difficult starts to record top-ten finishes in the women’s event. Mathematics student Joe Choong then produced the performance of his career so far to start the combined event of the men’s competition in silver-medal position....
University of Bath student Joe Choong enjoyed a strong start to his Olympic debut as the fencing ranking rounds got the Rio 2016 modern pentathlon competitions under way on Thursday. Choong, who studies Mathematics and is supported by an Ivor Powell Sports Scholarship, secured 22 victories from his 35 bouts in the Deodoro Youth Arena. That was the fourth-highest number of hits but an unfortunate late red card cost him a ten-point penalty and dropped...
She was the first-ever athlete to win an Olympic gold medal while training at the University of Bath and remains an inspiration to all at the Sports Training Village. Now Dr Stephanie Cook is confident of seeing more medallists follow in her celebrated footsteps when the modern pentathlon competitions take place over the next 48 hours. Cook and training partner Kate Allenby won gold and bronze respectively in the first-ever Olympic women’s modern pentathlon event...
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...
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...
Piers Gilliver – the world’s number-one ranked wheelchair fencer – today became the latest University of Bath-based athlete to be selected for the Rio 2016 Paralympic Games. The 21-year-old has enjoyed tremendous success during the past two years, winning nine medals in 12 international competitions – including three back-to-back World Cup titles – to comfortably finish top of the epee qualifying rankings. “I am so happy to be part of the ParalympicsGB team for Rio...
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...
Pentathlon GB’s Joe Choong, Jamie Cooke, Kate French and Samantha Murray today became the latest University of Bath-based athletes to be selected to represent Team GB at the Rio 2016 Olympic Games. The quartet were officially confirmed as being Britain’s modern pentathlon representatives during a team announcement at Hyde Park Barracks in London on Wednesday. All four train at the University of Bath, which has proudly hosted Pentathlon GB’s National Performance Centre since 1999 during...
