As an amazing fortnight of excitement, inspiration, and pride Team GB have achieved their greatest medal haul in 100 years – more than aided by a stunning showing from former School Games competitors!
While Team GB finished an incredible second in the final medal table, if the School Games had been a country the collective would have finished 17th in the table ahead of such nations as Canada, New Zealand and South Africa and only one medal behind Jamaica.
Just going to show that being an elite athlete as a teenager can set you up for elite success as an adult – 25% of the School Games alumni appearing at Rio left with a medal – this compares to 18% of Team GB as a whole.
Adam Peaty began the medal rush with a crushing victory in the men’s 100m breaststroke in which he also swam a new world record to prove himself the undisputed king of the pool in his class – a long way from competing at the School Games in 2010 and 2011.
Our swimmers competing this year at Pond’s Forge in Sheffield can look up to four more athletes who secured silver medals in Rio. Chris Walker-Hebborn, who competed in 2006, joined Peaty to secure 4x100m medley relay silver.
Ex-School Games competitors Stephen Milne and Dan Wallace also grabbed silver in the 4x200m freestyle relay. And 19-year-old Duncan Scott left with two silvers in each of the relays. The Scot was only competing at the School Games in 2013!
Perhaps the star of the entire Games for Team GB was Max Whitlock who became Britain’s most successful gymnast ever with two golds in the Pommel Horse and Floor to add to his team All-
Around bronze. Whitlock was only selected as a reserve for the 2006 School Games – and should be an inspiration to all those who don’t leave the Games with the result they want to keep striving.
2011 and 2012 competitors Nile Wilson and Amy Tinkler joined Whitlock in a very successful year for Gymnastics with bronze medals in the Horizontal Bar and Women’s Floor respectively.
Team GB was utterly imperious in the Velodrome and the School Games threw up two more gold medallists in 2010’s Elinor Barker and 2009’s Owain Doull who both claimed the highest prize of all in the Women’s Team Pursuit and Men’s Team Pursuit.
Katy Marchant, who appeared at the same Games as Doull but competed on the track in athletics, rounded off the School Games medal rush in the cycling with a bronze medal in the Women’s Sprint.
Out on the track, Dina Asher-Smith achieved her dream of an Olympic medal just four years after she lined up at the Olympic Stadium in 2012 during that year’s School Games. The 20-year-old took bronze in the Women’s 4x100m Relay alongside fellow School Games alumni Darryl Neita.
Two-time School Games star Emily Diamond in the 4x400m relay also secured a bronze medal around 10 years after she appeared in her first School Games in 2006.
Sophie Hitchon doesn’t even hold the School Games record in the hammer – the record being broken last year – however that won’t have hurt too much as she became the first female British medallist in the Hammer Throw, taking bronze.
And rounding off a simply incredible final weekend, the Women’s Hockey team went two better than 2012 and won the gold medal with three-time School Games competitor Lily Owsley and 2008 hopeful Georgie Twigg both playing key roles.
A simply incredible fortnight of sport and a massive congratulations to all the former School Games athletes who have gone on to achieve greatness in their sports at the Olympic Games. Which athletes from the 2016 School Games will be the next to follow in their footsteps?