Coopers athletes ‘bring pride to the school’

Coopers junior girls were runners-up at Bedford (Image: Archant)

Coopers Coborn’s Head of PE Helen Davies congratulated student athletes for their performances in the past academic year as both their boys and girls reached the National Finals together after a 25-year wait.

The teams had left teachers and coaches beaming with joy after performing brilliantly throughout the year and Davies was extremely proud of their efforts.

She said: “I’m unbelievably proud of those athletes, I don’t have any favourites in terms of sports, but the dedication of those athletes was absolutely amazing.

“They trained every single day and they wanted it so much. It was really a whole team effort as such, not only the staff, but even the students and even the parents.

Coopers intermediate boys were eighth at Bedford (Image: Archant)

“It almost becomes a bit of an obsession working out the points system, of how to get there and they wanted it so badly from the second we went to train in Lanzarote all the way through the season.

“They wanted it so badly and it was so fantastic to see how well they actually did in the end, because it was so well deserved.”

The Lanzarote trip allowed the students to train in warm weather in order to prepare themselves at the hardest level possible.

The trip was organised for the athletes to have some time to relax as well as training them in preparation for their oncoming competitions.

Davies thought the training was of the highest quality for the team: adding: “It did help the students massively, in terms of team bonding, but also in terms of the actual training.

“What they did was really intense for both track and field and I think it just sort of kick started their season quite nicely to improve throughout the year.

“We got lots of titles throughout the year, not only at national level, but at borough level, county level, the Lee Valley outdoor cups.

“We have been to lots of prestigious schools, like Marlborough College, Radley, Harrow, for lots of athletics fixtures and I think the proof is the end result which we got in the end.”

The boys were led by Mayowa Osunsami, who is currently ranked the second fastest hurdler for his age in the country, and the team was able to gain solid performances off of his enthusiasm and fight throughout the year to progress to its first national final in 25 years.

Davies was very proud of the boys for securing their spot and hailed them as “a strong group”.

“The boys haven’t been for many years, the girls have been consistently,” added Davies.

“For the past few years the girls have come second in the country last year, but we had two teams come second in the country this year.

“The intermediate boys haven’t been to a national final for 25 years so for them to achieve that is absolutely fantastic.

“It was a strong group of boys, nearly every single one of them went to Lanzarote for warm weather training.

“We have got an amazing captain in Mayowa Osunsami who is second in the country for hurdles and he is a fantastic role model to those boys.

“The boys have really fed off him in terms of his infectious enthusiasm. Hopefully they are now setting the standards for the junior boys, because the girls have always been getting to those national finals and it is great to see the boys now following suit.”