The County Sports Awards winners were revealed on Wednesday 2 April at a ceremony hosted by Sport Hampshire & IOW at Southampton Football Club
The event was presented by Kris Temple from BBC South Today. and the evening began with a look back at a number of projects and campaigns that Sport Hampshire & IOW have been involved with that have all built on the legacy of 2012 including: Project 500, Hampshire Games, Do More Be More, Community Games, Hampshire Olympic & Paralympic Legacy, Disability Coaching Network, RoadSHIOW, Workplace Challenge.
Havant had winners in two the 18 award categories. Elliott Wells and Jake Todd of Hayling Island Sailing Club won the Junior Team of the Year Award for sailing and Peter Darts representing athletics won the Official of the Year Award.
Elliott Wells & Jake Todd were selected in 2012 to the Royal Yachting Association National Junior Sailing Squad for the second year running (Elliott being the youngest Junior Sailing Squad member in history). Squad membership gives access to the facilities and coaches at the National Sailing Academy in Weymouth.
In 2013 Elliott and Jake competed at the RS Feva Euromed Championship in Malta collecting their first Gold of the year and then onto the National Championship and Inland National Championship picking up Gold medals at both events. In late July the boys went to Italy to represent GBR in the RS Feva World Championships competing against the 180 boats of the world's best junior sailors. After completing 15 races over 5 days the boys were once again on the podium collecting Silver medals. In August they switched to competing nationally at Youth level in the 29er class dinghy (a performance dinghy for juniors with Olympic aspirations) achieving a commendable top 10 result. Again Elliott was the youngest competitor in the fleet. For winning the Feva National Championships the boys were invited to compete in the prestigious Endeavour Trophy - the Champion of Champions regatta - against reigning adult National Champions. Elliott and Jake as the youngest pairing achieved 11th place against 26 other pairings of top experts in sail boat racing in Great Britain. Without doubt this was viewed in the sport as another highlight of their outstanding year.
Major overall achievements:
- RS Feva Inland Champs - GOLD,
- RS Feva National Champs – GOLD
- RS Feva EuroMed Champs – GOLD
- RS Feva World Champs – SILVER
Peter Darts, athletics winner of the Official of the Year Award, is a Field Judge for National and International athletics meetings.
He is a qualified Track Judge, Starters Assistant and Field Tutor. He holds a Level 4 Track & Field qualification, the highest possible qualification for British Athletics Officials.
Peter officiated at the London 2012 Olympics and Paralympics, the 2013 Sainsbury’s Anniversary Games. He had many other National appointments in 2013, plus a European appointment as a Field Judge. Also in 2013 Peter was appointed National Technical Delegate at the England Athletics under 15 and 17 Championships at Bedford. For 2014 Peter has been appointed as a Field Official at the forthcoming Commonwealth Games in Glasgow.
Peter delivers a range of courses on a nationwide basis and is supportive of local athletics at Club, County and Hampshire Schools events and serves on the Hampshire Officials sub-committee.