Host of successes from stars
Josh Lynch, a Year 8 pupil at the school, will be part of the Wales squad that will compete at the Junior Battle Championships, which will be held in Austria in June.
The 13-year-old booked his place with the squad following a number of standout efforts so far this season, which have seen him claim a British Age Grade Championships and smash nine Welsh records in what has been an extremely promising young career to date.
The young star, who has been tipped for future Olympic honours by coach and Commonwealth Games hopeful Harry Mysagni, is also a member of the Sale Sharks Rugby Academy and helped Rydal Penrhos’ U14 Hockey side reach the National Schools’ Final.
Mr Boyd, said: “Josh is thoroughly deserving of his Welsh selection given the amount he has achieved throughout the year.
“Although he is still developing, the amount of potential he has bodes significantly well for the future, and this will be another fantastic experience for him as Josh looks to add to his already impressive list of accolades.
“This is something that I am confident he has can do and everyone at Rydal Penrhos wishes Josh well with the national squad at the championships.”
Martyna Ruszkowska and Zach Speakman, Year 11 and 9 pupils at the school, came away with a haul of medals from the Welsh National Championships, which were held in Swansea recently.
Swim Wales international Martyna, aged 16, was severely hampered by injury but still managed to claim gold in the 50m butterfly and bronze in the 100m backstroke, almost breaking her own Welsh short course record in the process.
She then moved on the British Nationals in Sheffield, but injury meant the pupil was not at full fitness and narrowly missed out on qualification for the Commonwealth Youth Games.
Martyna said: “Missing out on the Commonwealth is devastating for me but now I just need to focus on recovering and getting back into that pool stronger.”
There was further success in the form of Zach, who boosted his chances of his first Welsh squad selection with gold in the 100m backstroke in a time of one minute and three seconds.
The 14-year-old also claimed three silver medals in the 200m backstroke, 4x100m freestyle relay and 4x100m Individual Medley relay, and he made it an impressive six medals from the event with bronze in the 400m IM and 4x200m Freestyle relay.
A very enjoyable and hard fought afternoon saw the houses battle it out for Individual and Team success.
My thanks to Mrs Cashell and Mr Joyce who assisted in running the competition and to those that came along and supported.
The first activity, the gym tests saw a great rivalry between Jack Jones from Beecholme and Leo Ludwig from Netherton who completed the three tasks equal first.
Sydney Johnson, from Edwards, won both the standing Long Jump and 50m sprint whilst Noah Wiedenmann of Beecholme coolly won the Basketball lay-ups.
Leo Ludwig won the Agility test and Jack Jones won the target golf, shooting to within 4.15m of the pin to Leo’s 4.80, much to Noah’s frustration.
Sydney outshone the boys in target football, the only person to score three goals which meant that the Pwllycrochan run saw four competitors in the title hunt and three houses all within touching distance of the house prize.
In the event, second from Jack and fifth from Noah was enough to see Beecholme top the table, two points from Edwards who were a further two points from Netherton. Congratulations to Noah, Jack and Esteban.
Noah finished fourth overall as Jack and Leo fittingly shared second place after their intense rivalry all afternoon.
The competition, held since 2011, has seen Mario Weyers, Nick von Detten, Ronnie Mueller (twice), Danny Evans and Lukas Foerster as its individual champion.
After six years of male dominance, having won four of her six events and finishing second and fourth in the other two, the 2017 Superstars champion and first time female winner is Sydney Johnson.