Wednesday, 25 September 2013

Friday, 16 August 2013

V Festival on Channel 4 and 4Music

T4 alumni Steve Jones and Edith Bowman have been lined up to present V Festival 2013 on Channel 4.

Top acts from the two day live music event, which takes place this weekend, will be shown in live shows on Channel 4 and 4Music, while highlight shows will air nightly on Channel 4 on both days of the festival.

Music fans will be treated to live performances and interviews from some of the hottest acts in music right now, including The Kings of Leon, Jessie J, Paloma Faith, Maverick Sabre, The Script, The Saturdays, The Vaccines, Basement Jaxx  and many more. The 4Music stage is also returning to the festival this year, hosting acts such as Rita Ora, Tom Odell, Calvin Harris, Labrinth and James Arthur.

As well as the lives shows, 4Music is dedicating the whole week of programming to  V Festival. Highlights include:

Friday 16th August: Feelgood Friday - V Festival Warm-up - 5.30pm
Saturday 17th August: Live - 4.40pm/ Top 10 V Festival Acts 2013 - 7pm
Sunday 18th August:  Saturday Highlights - 2.15pm LIve - 4.40pm
Monday 19th August: Sunday Highlights - 6pm
Thursday 22nd August: The Best Bits – 6.30pm

Alternatively, viewers can watch live on the 4Music.com live player: http://www.4music.com/watch-now

Wednesday, 14 August 2013

Sport England support for local cricket club

Sport England yesterday revealed that more than 1,300 local sports projects across the country have now received National Lottery funding through Inspired Facilities, part of its Olympic and Paralympic legacy program.

England player Chris Tremlett with members of HBBH CC last year.
Holcombe and Blue Bell Hill Cricket Club will receive £50,000 of National Lottery funding to build a new changing room block adjacent to the current pavilion, and to refurbish the existing building into a larger bar and recreation room. The project will allow the club to offer greatly improved sports facilities to members and to also use the refurbished pavilion for a wider range of non-cricket purposes. Meridian Girls Football Club will use the facility in the winter months and the successful bid was a result of close co-operation between the two clubs.

To celebrate the award, local people are being invited to free taster sessions at one of the regular training sessions for all ages. Please contact Head Coach Dave Hayward on 07866 763592 for details.

Sport England's Chair, Nick Bitel, said: "A year on from the Olympics, this National Lottery investment is helping us deliver a lasting sporting legacy in North Kent. With investment now on offer from our Inspired Facilities Fund until 2017, we look forward to supporting many more sports clubs in North Kent who play such a vital role in grassroots sport."

Club Chairman, John Underwood, said: “We are delighted that we now have the funds in place to further develop our facility. This project will allow us to improve the standard of cricket and football we offer in the local community”

Club Facilities Development Officer Colin Dix said “This is a key milestone in the development of our club. Our refurbishment programme is fundamental to our ongoing efforts to grow the club and to strengthen our playing membership for future”.

Local MP, Tracey Crouch, said: “I am absolutely delighted that the Club has been awarded this funding to improve facilities. It will make a huge difference to the development of cricket in the area and support girls football during the winter. This is a really positive step forward for local sport”


Colin Dix and John Underwood speaking about their merger.

Holcombe and Blue Bell Hill Cricket Club is one of well over 300 projects across England receiving lottery investment from the fourth round of the Inspired Facilities fund and one of more than 1,300 to benefit overall. Many more communities are now set to benefit from the hugely popular fund, after Sport England today announced that it was extending Inspired Facilities until 2017, with an additional £40 million of National Lottery funding to invest. Bids will be accepted for the next round of Inspired Facilities funding from the 21 October 2013, You can find out more at: www.sportengland.org/inspiredfacilities

Wordless Wednesday


Wednesday, 24 July 2013

Spence bids to defend title as British team prepare to take on the world

Britain’s Mhairi Spence gets the opportunity to defend her World Championship crown when she competes at the most important modern pentathlon competition since the London 2012 Olympics next month.


Spence won the title in Rome in May of last year and is today named in the GB team to contest the 2013 World Championships in Kaohsiung, Chinese Taipei, from 21 to 27 August.

The 2012 championships were held earlier in the year than usual because of the Olympics, so Spence has had the privilege of reigning as world champion for just over 15 months.

“I was really proud to win the World Championships last year,” she said. “I finally achieved what I knew I could do. It’s nice when you know you’re the best in the world at something, not everyone gets to be a world champion.

“The World Championships have a big meaning for me, because it was also my first individual gold medal,” she added. “I don't think it puts any more pressure on me this time around though. I always go to competitions wanting to do the best I can and wanting to get on the podium.”

Spence, now ranked 10th in the world, is joined in the British team Kaohsiung by another 2012 World Championships individual medallist, Samantha Murray, currently ranked nine in the world.

Murray’s bronze last year was enough to secure her a place on the British team for the London 2012 Olympics, where she won the silver medal, Britain’s last medal of the Games.

Kate French and Freyja Prentice also feature in the GB women’s team for Kaohsiung. Prentice was the highest placed GB woman at this month’s European Championships finishing fourth at her first major competition back from a lengthy spell on the sidelines through injury.

French finished 10th in the individual competition at the Europeans and partnered Spence and Murray to gold in the team event. She won another gold in the women’s relay with Murray and Katy Burke. Burke is non-travelling reserve for the women’s team for the World Championships.

Jamie Cooke, Britain’s 2011 world junior champion who won his first World Cup gold medal in Hungary in May, is confirmed for the men’s team along with double Olympian Sam Weale.

Joe Evans, the 19-year-old who won bronze at his first World Cup in the USA in February, has qualified for the team through the Pentathlon GB ranking list.  He will make his senior World Championships debut if he is fit and healthy after next week’s World Junior Championships in Szekesfehervar, Hungary.

Double Olympian Woodbridge will be assessed midway through the forthcoming two-week training camp at altitude at Font Romeu in the French Pyrenees to see if he has sufficiently recovered from injury to contest the championships.

Nineteen-year-old Sam Curry is non-travelling reserve.

The Britain train at the Pentathlon GB High Performance Centre at the University of Bath. The University today announced a strengthened partnership with Pentathlon GB. A separate release has been issued on this entitled Unique partnership strengthens University’s sporting reputation

GB athletes competing at the World Championships(Name – date of birth, from – lives)

Women

Kate French  - 11.02.91, Meopham, Gravesend - Bath
Samantha Murray – 25.09.90, Clitheroe, Lancashire - Bath
Freyja Prentice -  20.05.90 – Inverurie near Aberdeen - Bath
Mhairi Spence – 31.08.85, Farr, near Inverness - Bath

Non-travelling reserve
Katy Burke – 01.06,89, Cleveleys, near Blackpool - Bath

Men
Selected
Jamie Cooke  - 03.03.91, Cheltenham – Bath
Joe Evans *  - 05.09.93,  Whitchurch, Shropshire – Bath
Sam Weale – 09.02.82, East Coker near Yeovil, Somerset

*subject to being fit & healthy after World Junior Championships

Fitness to be assessed at Font Romeu
Nick Woodbridge – 01.07.86, Telford, Shropshire - Bath

Non-travelling reserve
Sam Curry – 03.09.93, Redhill - Bath

Women

Kate French  - 11.02.91, Meopham, Gravesend - Bath
Samantha Murray – 25.09.90, Clitheroe, Lancashire - Bath
Freyja Prentice -  20.05.90 – Inverurie near Aberdeen - Bath
Mhairi Spence – 31.08.85, Farr, near Inverness - Bath

Non-travelling reserve
Katy Burke – 01.06,89, Cleveleys, near Blackpool - Bath

Senior British medals in 2013World Cup 1: bronze – Joe Evans, Palm Springs, USA, February

World Cup 4: gold – Jamie Cooke, Budapest, Hungary, May
            bronze – Mhairi Spence, Budapest, Hungary, May

European Championships: gold – women’s team relay (Katy Burke, Kate French    & Samantha Murray) Drzonkow, Poland, July
            gold – women’s team (Kate French, Samantha Murray & Mhairi Spence) Drzonkow, Poland, July
                                                bronze – men’s team relay (Jamie Cooke, Sam Curry & Joe Evans) Drzonkow, Poland, July

2013 World Championships schedule
Wednesday 21 August: Women’s individual qualification
Thursday 22 August: Men’s individual qualification
Friday 23 August: Women’s individual & team final
Saturday 24 August: Women’s individual & team final
Sunday 25 August: Mixed relay
Monday 26 August: Women’s relay
Tuesday 27 August: Men’s relay

Pentathlon GB is the National Governing Body for the Olympic Sport of Modern Pentathlon. For further information please see www.pentathlongb.org
 <http://www.pentathlongb.org/> 
You can also follow us on Facebook at www.facebook.com/PentathlonGB
 <http://www.facebook.com/PentathlonGBand on Twitter at www.twitter.com/PentathlonGB <http://www.twitter.com/PentathlonGB
The modern pentathlon sees athletes tackle fencing, swimming, show jumping and a run/shoot all in one day.

Great Britain's women have collected an impressive haul of five modern pentathlon medals from the last four Olympic Games, with Steph Cook winning gold at Sydney 2000 and Kate Allenby bronze, Georgina Harland taking bronze at Athens in 2004, Heather Fell winning silver at Beijing in 2008 and Samantha Murray taking silver at London last year.

Wordless Wednesday


Tuesday, 7 May 2013

3BT: Happy Tunesday

As you know, if you follow me on Twitter (via Blipfm), I had a bit of a Star Wars fest on Saturday (May the fourth etc ...) but it got me thinking about the wonderful composer that is John Williams, and how his memorable themes have graced some of the most iconic movies of a generation. The hard part is reducing them down to a trio. Since you can hear Star Wars here - I've resisted the urge and settled for these instead:

Harrison Ford is probably more synonymous with Indiana Jones now ...


... while this lovable little creature stole our hearts with an uplifting soundtrack - remember the cheering in the cinema, when the bikes took off?


And finally, clever producers knew there was only one man to turn to for the soundtrack to Harry's story.


I'm off to track down his 'Best of' on my Kindle ...

Tuesday, 30 April 2013

3BT: Happy Tunesday

Today: Reminiscing of school days - I've a school reunion coming up soon and these are three of the songs I associate with the youth centre:

On the cusp of Punk, The Stranglers produced the most often hummed but short harmony with Peaches ...


We followed this on the jukebox (proper old jukebox mind, not your modern rubbish!) with X-Ray Spex and Germ Free Adolescents (gotta love that title, so apt) ...


So far, so punk - which made this next choice quite a strange one. I put it down to the fact that the eighties were so much better than it gets credit for. We could wear what we wanted, listen to what we wanted, we weren't pigeon holed and if we wanted to listen to Diana Ross alongside punk, we damn well did! Here she is with Touch Me In The Morning:

Tuesday, 23 April 2013

Happy Tunesday

My new favourite song this week is a very groovy throwback to those heady disco days of the 70s and 80s. The Brand New Heavies with Sunlight. I dare you not to sway ...