Amber Valley Athletes are East Midlands Champions
It was ‘Amber for Go’ at Grantham Meres Leisure Centre as young sportshall athletes from Amber Valley triumphed again. The team of 30 boys and girls, aged 9 to 11 years, competed on Saturday 24th November against 7 other teams representing county and districts from the East Midlands, in the annual Norwich Union ‘Fun in Athletics’ Festival.
The Amber Valley team won both the boys and the girls competitions seeing off the Lincolnshire Imps team in 2nd place. Sportshall Athletics is traditional track and field brought indoors, using specially adapted equipment and events such as foam javelin, standing long jump and obstacle relays. The programme of 7 different relays and 9 different field events are all designed to test the youngsters speed, strength, coordination, agility and balance.
The Amber Valley team represents the Borough and is selected from local cluster competitions in September and October, involving over 700 children from around 40 primary schools. The process of school competition through to the Final is organised by Amber Valley Borough Councils Athletics coordinator, with substantial assistance from volunteers and coaches from Amber Valley Athletic Club, and volunteers on the Sports Development Team's Leadership Development programmes.
The Amber Valley team has an almost unbroken record of success over the past 8 years of entering the East Midlands Final. The Borough has developed a fine tradition of producing talented teams and is an excellent example of strong working links between the Boroughs schools, the local authority and Amber Valley Athletic Club.
Many of the athletes introduced to athletics via the sportshall teams, have gone on to national success in track and field and cross country.
More details about sportshall athletics and results from the competition can be found on www.sportshall.org For further information on Amber Valley Atheltic Club, contact Julie Feeney on 01773 841428 or julie.feeney@ambervalley.gov.uk or alternatively visit www.avac.org.uk