Diocesan Touch Trials for 2023

Scarlett Newberry, Samuel Reeves, Baxter Clark, Darcy Sisson, Flynn McFarlane and Myles Cox attended the diocesan touch football trials in Tamworth today. All of these students put in a huge effort and played exceptionally well, with Scarlett progressing to the possible's and probable's and was then selected for the Diocesan team. Congratulations and well done to Scarlett!! We wish you all the best for when you travel to Parkes to represent the Armidale Diocese at the Touch Football Polding Trials on Tuesday 28th March 2023.

Armidale Triathlon Club Schools Teams Challenge

Armidale Triathlon Club Schools Teams Challenge - By Olive McFarlane

On Sunday 13th of November, six triathletes competing and representing the school of St Mary of the Angels school, Guyra, had early rises to get to The Armidale School (TAS) for the Armidale Triathlon Club Schools teams challenge where many students from a variety of schools in the area create teams of three to complete in the three forms of sports in the triathlon. Teams gathered from Uralla, Walcha, Ben Venue, TAS, PLC, Armidale City, ASC, St Mary of the Angels (SMOTA) and many others that were eager to compete in this amusement and fun for exuberant children like all of the competitors. Once the teams were gathered, you needed to select one person from each team to do a leg of the race. The legs were running, swimming and cycling which suit the abilities of SMOTA students.

On Saturday afternoon, only two students were selected in each of the two teams and two people were still needed for the cycling and swimming events. Luckily, at 4:00pm Saturday afternoon two life-saving boys stepped in and the two teams representing the proud SMOTA school were locked-in. The teams ranged from year 4 students to year 6 and were packed with strong, capable abilities and were ready for the big race but exhilarating laughter on Sunday. The teams consisted of:

Team 1- Camilla Grills (Swimmer), Olive McFarlane (Runner) and Tom Graham (Cyclist).

Team 2- Flynn McFarlane (Swimmer), Sam Reeves (Runner) and Myles Cox (Cyclist).

On Saturday night, students and supportive parents scattered around homes to prepare for this splendid and spectacular race, though nerves and liveliness rattled down spines as eyes drooped down for an energy building sleep.

Sunday Morning- 7am

Many of our triathletes and families had early rises on Sunday morning, so that they could arrive at TAS in time to stretch and enter into the infamous event. Once we were all there and perched with all of our things in a nice shady spot away from the blaring sun, we were prepared. Camilla and Flynn (the swimmers) placed there trackers on their legs, Olive and Sam (the runners) wrote their numbers on their arms and Tom and Myles (the cyclists) prepared their bikes. Once everything was nicely prepared, the people who run the competition explained what the whole thing was, where to go and how the whole thing works. Once this was understood the teams were ready to go and SMOTA’s teams, using their amazing memory skills, started themselves in a place where they could get prepared in a neatly manner. The order or events were Secondary then Primary schools and there were categories of Primary All Girls, Primary All Boys and Primary Mixed, Secondary All Girls, Secondary All Boys and Secondary Mixed. The order of racers were swimmers, cyclists and then the runners would take the home stretch and complete the race successfully in hope.

Camilla and Flynn started off the event as the swimmers and dived into the pool flawlessly, Flynn first and Camilla not far behind him. Their assigned role for their team was to do 4 laps of a 25 metre pools which added to be 100m swim. This was a clean sweep of their leg and they soon ripped out of the pool. Flynn as effortlessly out passing the tracker over the line and into the hands of Myles who was the cyclist for their team. As he mounted up the ragged track, Camilla flew out of the large pool and whipped the tracker to Tom who within a split second was on his bike and trekking up the never-ending hill in record time. The required length to ride for these young chaps was 5 kilometres which was drawn out, but quickly blown away as the astounding teams that were taking the Top 5 places flipped from on top of their bikes and battened the tracker to their runner. Half of the race was already demolished spotlessly and leaving the running leg of the race which was a miniscule length of 1 kilometre. The cycling leg of the race for Team 2 (the shorties) was completed successfully by Myles as he merged closer and closer to their team’s runner Sam. A quick change was made by Myles clipping his bike to the rack in seconds and tossing the tracker to Sam as he flashed past the start line of his leg. Some students from astonishing teams were already on the horizon from the finish line and clapping came hurricaning from the crowd.This didn’t stop Team 1’s cyclist Tom, as his legs pumped down the hill without pause and unstrapped the tracker. Olive was Team 2’s runner who whizzed past the start line without flaw and was exiting the gate into the challenging but muscle-building track. All of the cyclists and runners had finished their leg and were understandably puffed out in joy. As they watched fluorescent blurs in the distance, runners came in hot with a strong finish like they were sprinting the whole way round. Cheers! Chants! Applause! Came booming in from supporters for a job well done. After a few strong runners that swept away a clean 5 minute race, Sam, Team 2’s runner, crossed the finish line with a flash in his heart, twinkle in his eye and most of all, a ginormous smile. The boys from his team and many others surrounded him and huddled for the success and happiness they went through. Although it was happy days from then on for Team 1, Team 2’s runner, Olive, was yet to come as she bounded from the bottom of the horizon and grew a bigger figure in the distance. She crossed the finish line with speed and stamina and (I can’t argue), a grasping breath. Everyone cheered and this created new confidence and motivation for the last few runners to cross the finish line.

After a few congratulations and words of congratulations of achievement, people started merging out of TAS. A generous amount of icy poles were given out to the many who were affected by the blaring sun. After the presentation, we knew we had some news to tell. This included the fact that Team 1 came 4th out of the Mixed Primary Schools category and Team 2 came 5th out of the All Boys Primary Schools category. It was such an amazing achievement for a small group of students like us who could throw up a team within a day and just go out there and do so well. We thank the organisers and club President for Armidale Triathlon Club, parents and carers that were able to drive all of the participants down and the many others who tried their hardest and woke up at 6am on a Sunday morning so that we can get out there and do some sport instead of staying inside all day. “I loved how we tried our best and had lots of fun. Secondly I also liked how we had good competition and how the track was challenging as well”. Look out next year for these triathletes!

Water Familiarisation Program

The Water Familiarisation Program will operate each Friday from Friday the 21st October 2022 through to Friday 2nd December 2022. All students will need to bring a towel and swimmers (and goggles if they wish) in a labelled bag. All items of clothing should also be labelled. This year, entry to the pool is $4.50 and season passes will be accepted.

Hot lunches will run as normal.

Parents are required to complete the Compass event permission note and the questions relating to swimming ability and medical conditions as soon as possible. Please note if the questions are not complete, permission is not granted.

Leading Edge Rugby League Academy -Guyra/Armidale - Rugby League Program 2023

LERLA is a Junior Rugby League development program, designed to help improve the skills and knowledge of all players who play this amazing game. LERLA will be looking to base a program in Guyra or Armidale (pending interest) for a short program in 2023. This will be a four day program (during the week training of an afternoon and on the weekend).

For more information and to register your expression of interest please click on the link below.

https://forms.gle/wzZCKzgQ9dyPkgk5A

Armidale Alligators Swim Club

Armidale Diocesan Primary Sport Website and Facebook

The Armidale Diocesan Primary Sport Council has a website and facebook page where you can go to find details on the various Diocesan and sporting events.

The web addresses are below:

https://www.facebook.com/ArmidaleDiocesanPSC/

https://sites.google.com/arm.catholic.edu.au/primarysport/home

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