Golden Start for Edinburgh’s BUCS Nationals Athlete’s

Fencing
With a first and a second seed in the women’s sabre it was always a possibility that this would lead to an all-Edinburgh final. Both Chloe Dickson and Giulia Gasparin duly delivered easing through the knockout rounds. After a tense semi-final victory of a one-point margin Giulia secured at least a silver paving the way for an all-Edinburgh clash.

It was Giulia who started off brightly putting some early pressure on event favourite Chloe Dickson taking an early lead. Chloe Dickson begun to grow into the fight picking off points before taking a commanding 15-9 victory taking the gold, bettering her previous BUCS result of a silver in this event last year. Giulia Gasparin can take a lot of heart from her performance and tomorrow she will join together with Chloe Dickson in the Foil Pairs where they aim for gold. 

Unlike some other sports, the athletes who bow out in the earlier rounds in fencing, still have plenty to play for. Making another one to two for Edinburgh’s fencers was Chan Paul Po Ling and Susie Seddon Cowell in the women’s sabre plate final taking first and second with a University College London athlete in third. 

In the men’s Epee event Dylan Morrison put in a solid performance to finish his day’s work in 9th place, one place higher than he originally thought. 

Overall, a very successful first day at BUCS Nationals at the Ponds Forge International Sports Centre. With many more events and opportunities for Edinburgh to add to their medal tally especially in the Foil, today’s performances put them in a good position to do that. 

Badminton
The Olympic Legacy Park at the English Institute of Sport played host to the badminton and athletics action. Our badminton team came here in good numbers, playing in both the singles and doubles. 

First up we had Benedict Tan who showed excellent determination to come behind from a set down to advance to the next round. Coming on top after an opening set setback to come through the best of three match 21-14 and a 21-18 over his Cambridge opponent. Not even a nervy wait in the last set with the game finely poised at 15-14, to await the decision of an umpire on a contentious decision (which went against him) put Mr Tan off. 

In his second game he unfortunately came up short against his opponent T Long from Manchester University. An error strewn first set resulted in a quick turnaround to begin the second set where Benedict again demonstrated his determination and refusal to give up. The second set was neck and neck all the way with Benedict looking likely to bring the match to a deciding set. It wasn’t to be for Benedict as his Mancunian opponent managed to pull away only after the scoreboard was tied at 16-16. A 21-18 loss in the second set was a significant difference from the 21-4 result in the first set, who knows if the match was a best of 5, he may have eventually got the better of his talented Manchester Opponent. 

Next up in singles action was Jonny Elsdon who participated in an entertaining match against his Strathclyde counterpart. This match went all the way to 3 sets as well, with some entertaining rallies bringing out the best in both athletes. The first set went past 21 with Strathclyde coming through narrowly to take the first set 22-20. An Edinburgh resurgence overcame Strathclyde to take it to a deciding set coming through 21-19. Alas a 2-point winning margin in the deciding set would not be needed, unfortunately it was the maroon colour of Strathclyde who edged this thrilling game 21-15. 

Later on, in the evening our doubles pairings were on court compromised off Ai Jiang & Derek Zhao whom progressed through two rounds before bowing out in the third round. Our Bake-Off Champ Peter Sawkins was in action in the mixed doubles alongside Sophia Schubert progressing through the first round before falling short in the second round. 

Athletics

The athletics track just next door opened its proceedings for the 2022 BUCS Nationals Championships. It was here that Logan Fearn ran 7.42 in the 60metres unfortunately not quite enough to progress out his heat in 7th place. Just shy of his PB by 0.02 though so hopefully Logan is not too far away from a PB performance. An athlete who did successfully PB was Karolina in the shot put with 11.29 metres.

1.49-man Sam Brown came through his opening heat with ease coming through in 2:01.54 advancing to the semi-final, could the Edinburgh University Athletic and Edinburgh AC athlete Sam sneak his way to a medal this weekend? Next up it was Francisco Camacho who finished 5th place in 2:07.18 which wasn’t enough to progress with only the top two in each heat advancing. 

Swimming
Over at Ponds Forge the fourth sport we captured today was in the pool below the fencing action. In the longest pool event of the day Ella Thatcher Plant finished first in her heat to place herself in 9th position overall in  4:41.67. While in the 4x100m women’s open freestyle Edinburgh qualified first in the heats with a time of 3:48.91 with a Swansea and Bath quartet in second and third. Over to the men’s and the Edinburgh four finished fifth in the heats overall in 3:31.16.  Taking the plunge in the 1500m men’s open freestyle was Liam McLaughlin in 17:37.02 placing himself in 17th place. 

Finishing the first day in the pool with a silver lining was our Men/Women open 400m Medley team. Made up Scott Gibson, Kara Hanlon, Ciara Schloss and David Cumberlidge. Taking second position in a time of 3:55.17 sandwiched between Loughborough in 3:51.62 and Swansea in 3:55.95.