On 18 June the Foundation was invited to attend the Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park for the Panathlon London Final. Since 2010 the Foundation has provided over £60,000 of support for the Panathlon challenge, working with them to help young people achieve their best potential. The power of sport not only for health and learning new skills but for helping achieve a sense of personal well being has long been known. Panathlon Challenge offers sporting opportunities to over 5,000 young people with disabilities every year.
175 disabled students from 19 London schools gathered in the Copper Box arena to decide who would win the 2015 London Trophy and Plate fixtures. After a brilliant afternoon of matches, including Wheelchair slalom, sitting shotput and javelin, Croydon were crowned trophy champions, winning two of the day’s six events. Triple Paralympic medallist and Panathlon Ambassador Liz Johnson presented the winning team with the trophy.
Toyin Fabusiwa from the team said: “It’s amazing. I wasn’t expecting it to be honest, but we got it. This is my last year in my school as well, so this is an amazing way to go out”.
The winners of the Plate, The Village School from Brent, were presented with their winning trophy by Alex Brooker, presenter of Channel 4’s “the Last Leg” and Panathlon Patron. He said:
“I’m so pleased I got to come today. It’s amazing that Panathlon are hosting such a big final here in the Copper Box, an Olympic venue, with so many kids. It just shows how far the charity has come. If there’s anything that demonstrates an Olympic and Paralympic legacy, it’s this. Some of the legacy has got a bit lost along the way, but not here. That’s why I love it so much.”
We also caught up with one of our volunteers, Marciana Sy, who was helping out at the event. We had a chat with her to find out why she loves to volunteer; you can watch her video here.
Click here to read more about Panathlon and for a full list of the finals that are currently taking place nationwide.
