Abingdonian 2020

76 The Abingdonian It was a pleasure to welcome back all the members of the house at the start of the academic year, and of course to welcome plenty of new members. Along with a host of new third years, we welcomed Mrs Kaye, Dr Haar, and (re- welcomed) Ms Hancock to the tutoring team. The major house event of the first half- term was the House Singing Competition – traditionally not an area of strength for us! It was great to bring together a team of boys from across the full age range to help work on this, and after much debate, we settled on the brave choice of Bohemian Rhapsody . It was a huge challenge but under the incredibly enthusiastic leadership of Liam Deegan we came together and rose to it. Alas, despite our best efforts, we once again had to settle for our traditional placing of “joint fourth”. A lot of fun was had by all, however, not least the sixth form who after the annual whingeing at the start of the week, ended up performing with real gusto on the day! Still, there was plenty of talent on show elsewhere in Michaelmas Term, with an excellent mentoring programme being put together by Deputy Head of House Sinclair Pearce, Greg Lister being awarded the prestigious Arkwright Scholarship for Design Technology, Frederick Beneat winning the Arnott- Davidson trophy for bridge, William Bywater wowing us with a piano rendition of Schumann’s Warum, the Miell-Ingram brothers producing some astounding cross country performances, James Sparkes teaching science in local primary schools, and three of our sixth formers starring in the emphatic 30-3 victory against Radley 1st XV. This was far from our only success on the rugby pitch, with Elliot Broadbent, Tim Fowler and Zach Broad becoming county champions at U14 level, and Henry Bury, Edward Jones and Oscar Mitchell following suit at U18 level. The end of term saw the usual inter- house competitions, with some incredibly enthusiastic performances and some notable successes including both the U16 and U18 rugby teams claiming second, Joshua Ponting and Caleb Owusukwaah taking silver in table tennis, and, as has become custom, the U18 swimming team being crowned overall champions! That’s four years on the trot now – can they make it five out of five next year?! Perhaps the biggest shock, based on our performance in previous years, was victory for the chess team of Frederick Beneat, Roscoe Marshall and Henry Riehl. This was particularly enjoyable as the team spanned the entire age range within the house but came together brilliantly. This was similarly true in the impressive efforts of the cycling team of Greg Lister, Charles Symonds, Jamie Firth and Theo Scampion. Border’s House