Anglia Ruskin University retained their men’s team title at the British University and Colleges Sport (BUCS) Judo Championships over the weekend in Sheffield. 

Anglia Ruskin’s men’s team clinched the title for the third successive year after defeating Oxford University 4-1 in the final after beating Glasgow, Newcastle, Leeds, Bath and Loughborough in previous rounds.

In the individual events, there were bronze medals for Tara Fitzjohn (-52kg category), Mathew Kavanagh (-81kg category) and Josip Sancic (-90kg category).

Anglia Ruskin’s Bob Challis, an EJU level five High Performance coach, said: “This year we were worried about the team event as many players were injured before the competition.  That said all the players are very professional and focussed, which is why we got such an impressive result.

“I was also very pleased that we entered a women’s team for the first time – a historical moment in our judo history.

“It is a pleasure to be able to coach judo in an environment where we base our training on the research we’ve undertaken. I believe that this is a major part of our winning formula.”

Anglia Ruskin University has a strong and diverse judo programme that includes a community programme for coaching children, high performance coach education on behalf of the European Judo Union, a performance training group, and a judo research group that includes postgraduate study.  From September 2013 we will also be one of eight hub sites delivering the Advanced Apprenticeship in Sport Excellence on behalf of the British Judo Association.   More information on the programme can be found at www.anglia.ac.uk/judo or by emailing judo@anglia.ac.uk