we played hockey, netball, tennis and athletics. The boys did football, rugby, athletics and tennis. I think they did cricket and hockey but not sure. I went to a comp in Banbury Oxon We were the first comp to get through to the national hockey finals, representing the south of England. We didn't win tho . I also played for the local tech college and we also go through to the Nationals, but bizarrely representing the East! Our girls tennis team got through to nationals and played at queens club This is some of our team a couple of years ago at the House of Lords with our old P.E teacher who is now a Baroness
Played Cricket for School /local pub/ village & district, Best balling figure was 8 wickets / 15overs / 14 runs / 13 maiden Got in the local paper for that one Just play Tennis thats enough for me
my PE teacher put one word in my school report 'Weak'. ok, I wasn't the muscular type but I was a fast runner and came into my own with track events and cross country. mostly we were forced to play Rugby in the winter, with some cross country as well. In the summer it was cricket, cricket, cricket with some track and field. I hated cricket and joined the no hopers team. a Welsh chap called Ashman, built like a brick cowshed, took us for Rugby and he didn't bring out the best in us, we just messed about to wind him up. Me and my mates liked woodwork but Ashman was in charge and all he did was shout at us, especially as we used to put our planes sharp edge down deliberately to upset him.
Our chemistry teacher Mr Brinkworth used to leave all the exploding stuff until the last day of term, then fill the entire lab with smoke and bangs . I doubt whether he could do it these days, without submitting a 14-page Risk Assessment.
I'm definitely not a sporty type - ours was a rugby school and being small I avoided getting anywhere near the ball - but it turned out I could run and much to everyone's surprise I came second in the senior boys cross country - and then got selected for the mile on sports day and came 3rd with a time of 5 minutes and no training. In the 6th form I mistakenly picked up the ball playing rugby and ended up being selected for the school team as hooker - fortunately it was the bad winter of 62 and we only played 3 games. I did go on to run for fun and managed 36 minutes for a 10k when I was 55
I remember one chemistry lesson, we were cutting up pieces of sodium metal, kept in a jar of oil, on a sink draining board, it was an accident waiting to happen, I chose a big round piece and it rolled down into the sink plug hole and hit the water trap and that day we learned how Sodium reacts with water.
Was all fitba at my school, which I was Marmite at and hated. If you liked rangers , the Celtic boys hated you. If you liked Celtic the rangers boys hated you. If you didn't like fitba, everybody hated you.... When the opportunity of cross country running arose myself and a couple of mates saw the potential for smoking, so we signed up for it. Out the gate, over to theshelter in park for a fag and skin up. Then off through the fields , up the hill, smoke the j's, then onwards round the loop and back to school. We were conscientious idiots, so yes we did do the miles. After that I studied table tennis as it meant I could stay in the gym hall pishin about while the student PE teachers played cool records on a player theyd bring in. We would also meet these same student teachers in the hammy ( local notorious underage pub) for communal beveraging.
