Welsh success for Leeds Met athletes

Badminton players from Leeds Met are celebrating after an impressive medal haul at the Welsh Open in Cardiff.

Carnegie scholar Anita Raj Kaur won gold in the ladies singles event before triumphing with team-mate Joanne Quay in the ladies doubles. 

Leeds Met student Mark Middleton and Ben Stawski, who trains full time at Leeds Met high performance centre,  reached their first international final and took silver in the men's doubles with Middleton also picking up a bronze in the mixed doubles as well. This comes on the back of fantastic performances at the Scottish international in Glasgow the week before, where Mark and Ben reached the quarter final, and Mark also took Bronze medal in the mixed doubles, which was his first medal in a senior international.

Leeds Met sent a large squad to the Welsh International and Director of Badminton James Vincent was pleased with 8 players/ pairs making it through to the quarter final stage:   "This was a major breakthrough for us. 2 years ago we played this tournament and got no medals at all, just 1 ¼ final, last year we achieved two silver medals, but this year to take 2 golds, 1 silver, and 1 bronze was a massive achievement. Not only that we continued to support each other as a team, even though it is an individual event. It is hard to keep everyone motivated and on track in their training, but it is very rewarding when we get results like this, and shows we are moving in the right direction. The support and guidance I am given at Leeds met is first class, with a big focus on student experience, and developing talented badminton players".

Particularly impressive was fresher Josh Green who came through three qualifying matches, with the last match against a Malaysian player lasting an hour long. Josh then went on to win his first round and lost in the last 16  to a Russian seeded player in three sets in a match which again lasted just short of 1 hour, highlighting his developments in fitness since arriving here in september.

The success comes on the back of record success for the Leeds Met badminton programme at the recent British Universities and Colleges Sport (BUCS) Individual Championships in Nottingham where they took home a clean sweep of five gold medals, three silvers and a bronze.