Today we had a special visitor in school. Tracey Howson (a parent here at Farfield) joined us for the full day to share her own inspirational story of how an overweight and inactive girl/teenager/adult became World Kettlebell Champion.
Tracey’s exploits were first made known to us by our PE Governor who was equally inspired by the changes Tracey had made to her lifestyle and the achievements she has made within her sport.
In assembly this morning, Tracey spoke to the children and staff about how she changed the way she thought; changed the way she ate; and changed the way she exercised in order to loose 8 stone (50kg) in weight. Tracey delivered important messages which linked to this week’s ethos statement: ‘I can make positive changes that affect my health’.
Through her physical activity, Tracey was introduced to kettlebell workouts and then joined a club. Following local competitions, she qualified for the amateur England team and has now competed at 2 World Championships; the most recent saw her win gold at an event in Milan on Friday.
The children and staff were absolutely inspired (and entertained) by Tracey’s visit. In assembly this morning, Tracey demonstrated how to lift kettlebells properly and then some staff tried to compete against her. In 1 minute, Tracey managed to complete 21 repetitions of a lift and the staff could only manage about half this number. For the rest of the day, each class in KS2 accessed a circuit training session in the hall. At the end of the day, Tracey led an assembly to KS1 and Reception to tell them her story too.
I would like to say a huge thank you to Tracey for her time and effort in school today – it ended up being quite a workout for her. If you would like to find out more about Tracey, you could visit her website.
Below are some images from the assembly – it is not hard to identify the expert. Some more images of the circuits will follow:
