As the Lent Term concludes, now is an appropriate time to reflect on all that has been achieved, especially in sport. Whether it’s winning trophies, improving personal bests, or simply trying something new, success in sport this term has come in many forms.

Oundle teams and pupils have been able to savour numerous successes and here are a few of the highlights:

• The School’s third consecutive victory in the OO Multisport Weekend.
• The senior golf squad reached the ISGA knockout cup Area Final.
• In netball, there have been numerous unbeaten seasons in the U15Ds, U14Cs, Ds and Es, whilst the U14s, U16s and U18s squads all reached their respective regional finals. The U12s and U15s were crowned county champions. A promising start under new head of netball, Heidi Bray.
• In boys hockey, the U16s enjoyed an excellent run in the National Knockout Cup reaching the Quarter Finals. Overall, the boys sides from U12s up to the 1st team remained unbeaten in 55% of their fixtures.
• In football, the girls 1st team lost only one match whilst the boys U15As have set an impressive accomplishment of registering the best playing record all our U15 sides nationally. The seven sides have won 68% of their matches this term, despite disruption from the weather in early season.
• Cricket has seen the girls U13s and U15s perform exceptionally well at their respective indoor county finals.
• The boys U13s rugby 7s squad won the plate competition at the Maidwell 7s.
• At the Rosslyn Park 7s, Oundle fielded five squads including an U16s girls team for the first time. The boys U16s reached the national plate final having given their all in ten matches across a gruelling two days of competition.
• In cross country, nine pupils successfully qualified to represent Northamptonshire at the All England Championships held at Ardingly Showground. Marianna (Sco) finished ninth in the junior age group category and was subsequently selected to represent England at the Home Countries’ International Schools’ Cross Country Championship in Falkirk. The race at Falkirk went really well with Marianna coming 12th out of 32, and won an England team gold.
• As an aside, the girls cross country squad also won their inter-school league following a wet, but brilliant afternoon of racing at Rutland Water on the final Saturday of Term.

At the OARSport Junior Sculling Head held on the last Wednesday of Term, there were the following impressive results:

• WJ18 4x had a phenomenal performance from the senior girls crew, placing 7th nationally with an impressive time of 13:37.3. Without a doubt, it was some of the best results seen from a crew at this level, and is hugely promising for the Summer Term.

• J15 4x+ faced arguably one of the toughest divisions of the day, going up against 70 crews, including Windsor Boys, Marlow, and Henley. They took this race in their stride and held their own brilliantly throughout, achieving a remarkable 6th place with a time of 13:37.9 – a huge achievement and very promising results.

• Inspired by the J15s’ performance, the J14 4x+ delivered an outstanding display, despite their longest race being 2km. Archie Mayo showed some excellent manoeuvres (even earning praise from the Marlow RC coach), steering the boys through the field and overtaking two crews in the first leg. They secured 7th overall, finishing just 0.7 seconds off 5th place.

• The J18 4x- raced well against some seriously tough competition, whilst the WJ17 4x- also showed great potential in their race.

• Three crews have qualified to represent the East Region and we have a number of rowers with forthcoming junior GB trials over Easter.

The Gale Mile, House Indoor Rowing, Purbrook Memorial match , 24-hour row-a-thon and the end of term Dance Show all highlight events where progress and participation have been celebrated.

Badminton, fives, squash and shooting have all competed with aplomb and registered notable successes. In basketball the boys senior squad reached the knockout stages of the national cup.

Our swimmers once again performed admirably at the Bath and Otter Cups, and the waterpolo squad won bronze in the National Bowl competition.

So far this year, Oundle pupils have clocked up an impressive participation and representation rate of more than 80% for all years groups from Third to Upper Sixth Forms. In the First and Second Forms, this sits at a resounding 100%, and is such an important part of our sports and co-curricular offering.

It’s now time for pupils, staff and all supporters to enjoy a well earned break before we start all over again in the Summer Term.