Sixteen Prep Schools from as far afield as Suffolk and Somerset competed for the Steggall Trophy. The teams were divided into four groups and the matches were refereed by members of staff from a selection of public schools. At the end of the group stage the results were as follows:

Group A: The Downs, Swanbourne House, St Andrew’s and Christ Church Cathedral School

Group B: Beaudesert, The Elms, Pinewood and Prior Park

Group C: Dean Close JS, Old Buckenham Hall, Ashfold and Dragon Under 12 VII.

Group D: Abberley Hall, Hazelgrove, St Hugh’s and Abingdon.

The first two teams from each group moved into the main competition while 3rd and 4th placed teams played in the plate competition.

The Plate Competition was won by St Andrew’s with St Hugh’s as runners up. The Main Competition was won, for the second year running, by The Downs with Abberley Hall the losing finalists.

The medals and trophies were awarded by Matt Perry (Bath, England and British Lions) and a great afternoon of Rugby drew to a close as the sun sunk behind the trees.

JB

With a good range of children from Year 4 to Year 6 our archery team battled valiantly against an older and rather more accurate Prior Park Team.

The 1st team started really well and the four scored 23 in their first round, things looked good when Prior Park first team were at least five points down and our 2nd team notched up a higher total with Harry Fuller and Rowan Maslin hitting gold. The Prior Park 2nd team fired and suddenly our archers realized that it was going to be a challenging task to win the match. Then Pinewood fired off some excellent arrows which included a further gold by Molly Weeden and the 2nd team managed to snatch 2nd place while our first team finished 4th.

The match finished with a victory to Prior Park by 126 to 93.  All the competitors thoroughly enjoyed their first ever archery match and their thanks go to James for running the event.

Team members: Katie Reid, Molly Weeden, Cosmo Del Mar, Finn Wetton, Rowan Maslin, Max Smith, Dan Ayers and Harry Fuller.

Congratulations to Daniel Ayres who was the gold cup winner at the Southampton Samurai Judo Competition at the weekend.

A Pinewood Team of Dominic Hutchinson (captain), Lucas Prichard-Jones, Ned Corfield and Max Tite battled hard and won the fencing match versus Prior Park scoring 45 to 36.

It was an excellent afternoon of fencing and every team fought with skill and determination. Our thanks to Shaun Garley for organising the fixture and Prior Park for hosting it.

Congratulations to the following on completing their RYA sailing awards:

Level 2

Toby Acheson-Gray, Ben Adams, Lucas Prichard-Jones, Ben Shamash, Finn Simpson

Level 1

Alessandro Corrias, Robbie Clayton-Reid, Paddy Scudamore

Alex Norris, Jess Tregoning, Katy Meehan and Ben Ryder jumped superbly to become the 2011 National Champions in the Mini Show Jumping team event at the NSEA Championships last weekend and Jess was also individual champion on her second ride Joey B.

The team all jumped stylish clear rounds to lead after the first round. The top eight teams jumped in reverse order for the final in the main arena so the pressure was on.  Alex and Blue Fox jumped a very fast clear as trailblazer, but Jess with Hapni just tipped a pole for 4 faults.  To win, our last two riders had to go clear and they rode superbly to do just that, with Katy on Reach for the Stars and Ben on Ollie, both riding clears in fast times leaving us in the lead by 20 seconds.  Jess then rode the round of her life on Joey, cutting inside a fence, to take the lead by nearly 2 seconds and clinching individual victory. To be both team and individual champion is fantastic and shows just how well the children rode.  An amazing achievement!

The next day the team of Alex, Jess, Ben and Ryan Lockwood kept their cool despite some mishaps to ride beautifully in the Novice Jumping with Style championships to come 3rd with 3 good clears and few time faults, despite being one of the youngest teams.  It was a stiff course of 21 jumps with some tricky turns that caught out many, so this was a great result.

Ryan also came third as an individual in the Novice show jumping with a slick double clear to add to our tally of Pinewood prizes.

Pinewood now stand champions in mini schools show jumping, cross country and eventing in 2011, an outstanding achievement!

Congratulations to all concerned!

Melanie Norris