St Mary’s Scoops Six Medals at BUCS Nationals

Students from St Mary’s University, Twickenham scooped six medals at the 2014 British Universities and Colleges Sport (BUCS) Gatorade Nationals competition, which took place in Sheffield this weekend (21st to 23rd February). The BUCS Nationals is one of the biggest events in the higher education sporting calendar with more than 6,000 students from 134 institutions across the UK competing. More than 70 St Mary’s students took part in a number of events including badminton, swimming, athletics, karate and trampolining. The highlight of the weekend was a Gold medal winning performance by Sophie Santillo in karate, which sees the first year Sport Science undergraduate student qualify for the forthcoming World University Games in Montenegro. In the athletics events, Adelle Tracey took Silver in the Women’s 800m along with Ben Coldray in the Men’s 1500m event. Meanwhile it was Bronze for Daniel Cheeseman, also in the Men’s 1500m race, Karl Billington in the Men’s 3000m and Alex Lake secured a medal in the novice trampolining event. St Mary’s Athletics Union President Pietro Palladino said, “It was a great weekend of sport, we came away with some medals and everyone who competed had an enjoyable experience, it was good to see so many students represent St Mary’s on a national scale. I think this number will grow for next year after the successes that have come from the past few days. I’m very proud of everyone who took part this weekend, they are a credit to the Athletics Union and the University and should be very pleased with themselves. It was nice to see some new sports being represented in karate and trampolining, and to get medals in our first year, is a great achievement.”