Back to school as Tri-Knights launched by Castle Triathlon Series

Having hosted ‘the world’s largest children’s triathlon’ in 2013, at the Hever Castle Triathlon in Kent, the organisers of the Castle Triathlon Series are now turning their attention to introducing triathlon to schools across the UK. Their new Tri-Knights programme is positioned as an exciting new project that aims to help primary schools promote triathlon to pupils, while at the same time supporting the UK National Curriculum for Physical Education outcomes.

Created with input from leading sport and educational experts, Tri-Knights is a first-of-its-kind curriculum-linked triathlon resource for schools. It’s full of ideas on how to bring tri to life with practical lesson plans to help PE teachers introduce the fast-growing sport of triathlon into the school environment.

(Tri Knights has been created in partnership with Dr Elizabeth Scott at the theTriLife.com, and Dr Jackie Farr, a senior lecturer in Physical Education and Sport at the University of Greenwich. The Castle Triathlon Series also notes a big thank you to Highfield School in Hampshire and St Lawrence Primary School in Kent.)

The resource is completely free and is easy to download from the Castle Tri Series website. It provides all the information teachers will need to get started on a new and exciting multisport journey. Key features of Tri-Knights include support for staff with curriculum-linked activity sheets and lesson ideas for each discipline; the promise of assemblies hosted by elite triathletes; guidance from Castle’s qualified coaches and teachers; and recommendations of places to train.

Maintaining the Olympic Legacy
Triathlon was one of the sports to benefit from the London 2012 Olympic Games spotlight, with the Brownlee brothers becoming bona fide British sporting superstars off-the-back of their medal-winning exploits in Hyde Park.

British Triathlon, meanwhile, has recently reported notable growth in both its participation figures, with the number of race starts increasing by 18% to 174,293 in 2013 and the numbers of events up 11% to 993 in 2013.

The number of youth entrants in the Castle Triathlon Series ‘increased exponentially last year’. The Hever Castle leg of the Series in Kent saw its number of youth entrants double to 1,300 in 2013 to make it the world’s largest triathlon. 2,500 youth triathletes are expected in 2014, with the 2015 plan being to host a youth weekend of racing featuring 5,000 young multisport athletes.

For triathlon to maintain this upwards trajectory, the team at the Castle Triathlon Series stress that the sport must be embraced by mainstream education. A recent Sport England study discovered that the most popular sports for primary-aged children to take part in were swimming, cycling and running. The aim of Tri-Knights is to see this trio of activities combined in lessons to increase levels of activity, promote health and social benefits, and potentially create lifelong sporting habits.

As professional triathlete Catherine Jameson states, “Introducing triathlon into schools is a brilliant new initiative. Tri is not only great fun but you make lots of amazing new friends and you can take part simply for fun or to challenge yourself. I only wish I could go back to school and get involved in triathlon at a young age.”

Tri-Knights is available for schools to download now at castletriathlonseries.co.uk.

Since its formation in 2009, the Castle Triathlon Series has swiftly become one of Europe’s biggest triathlon series for elites and age-group athletes. The 2014 series will witness events at Cholmondeley Castle in Chester, Castle Howard in York and Hever Castle in Kent in England, Lough Cutra in Ireland and Chateau de Chantilly in France.

www.castletriathlonseries.co.uk