Wednesday, 2 May 2012

Bizarre sports at Roses 2012: Part II

Bizarre sport #4: Clay Pigeon Shooting

Clay pigeon shooting features in Roses 2012 on Saturday morning, being worth the full four points, with the match taking place at the Crabtree Clays. For Roses 2011, YUSU provided the shooting club with £1,000 of funds to take part. That is exactly four times higher than what LUSU are providing LUSC (Lancaster University Shooting Club) this year, although they did receive over £700 earlier this year to improve their coaching.


The teams will begin by shooting 100 Bird English Sporting and 100 Bird Team Flush. These are the most popular forms of the sport, with objects being thrown at a variety of heights and trajectories. The throws attempt to represent the movement of not just pigeons, but also pheasants, pigeons and ducks.

Only the top eight shooters from each side will be participating. York’s top eight shooters are as follows: Jack Amos, Charlotte Williams, Martin McClenaghan, Jordan Gillies, Ben Watkins, Jimmy, Ryan Hartwell and Harrison Spain. The team have had a decent season in BUCS, finishing in 10th position, whereas Lancaster slumped in 25th.

But beware! In the latest LUSC newsletter, they already know that York are residing in the George Fox building:

We thought it might be a nice idea to introduce ourselves to them during the night :-) Any ideas for a funny “welcome” are highly appreciated! (Ideas that involve loaded shotguns won’t be considered...)

Bizarre sport #5: Climbing

There are three different categories in competitive climbing – lead, speed and bouldering. At Roses, the climbing category will be bouldering, which is without ropes and involves technical, short climbs on a wall 4.5 metres high. The challenge will last approximately two hours and the climbers must complete as many of the problems as they can, and fill in the score sheet afterwards. Throughout the route, judges check the players are not taking short-cuts or cheating in any way. It is probably the most intensive, includes the most difficult obstacles and is also the most exciting to watch from a spectator point of view.

Three York teams are participating on Saturday which will each have two men and one woman. Only the A and B teams’ results count in terms of points, which total a very important 18 altogether. In short, the mountaineering club at York has some excellent climbers who are hitting their peak going into this year’s tournament. Points will surely be secured by the A team, which is particularly strong, and their preparation has been going according to plan at the local wall in Acomb, according to Mountaineering President, Susie Riketts.

Bizarre sport #6: Ballroom Dancing

Recreational dancing has of course been around for hundreds of years, but only in the last half-century has it been considered as something with a competitive dimension – known as“dancesport”. Despite this, it lingers on the margins and is unlikely to feature in the Olympics any time soon.

On Saturday, there will be 9 points up for grabs just for the dancing events, across a variety of categories. It includes beginner events for ballroom dancing and Latin dancing, which are worth a point each. There will also be the more advanced forms of these as well as ballet, modern, tapdance and contemporary dance.

Candidates will be assessed across a wide range of criteria, including poise, posture, timing, foot and leg action, and presentation. York can only hope that the judges are unbiased in their decision-making, because controversy has hit Roses in the past in similar sports, notably equestrian back in 2006.

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