Another exchange has come and gone, and now our touch and rugby teams are hard at work preparing for the rest of the season, including IASAS. The rugby boys have returned from Manila and the touch girls from Singapore.
The annual All-Asian Schools touch tournament took place at SAS, where the IASAS schools
were joined by other tough competitors including UWC Dover and even the ISKL JV team. Our
girls finished the weekend with lots of very tight games and were able to pull out a win against Saint Andrew’s in Singapore. Unfortunately, they weren’t able to play all of the teams they will face in IASAS, such as TAS and ISM.
Captain Becky Bradley (12) is looking forward to the next few weeks of training as they “now know what [they] must focus on for IASAS.” She reflects on exchange as a growth experience because “in Bangkok, [they] don’t get the opportunity to compete with many schools for touch,” sharing that “exchange is a great way to develop our individual and team skills.” She stays positive “although [they] did not win too many games, [they] kept improving throughout the tournament.”
The rugby boys fought hard all weekend and after four grueling games, they developed a good idea of what to work on when they meet these schools again in two months for IASAS in Jakarta.Despite the outcome of the games, the boys, and especially their parents, would count this tournament as a success due to the lack of injuries.
John Kim (12), captain of the boys rugby team, states that “as a team, we’re quite happy with the way we played. [The] team isn’t the biggest in size but [they’ll] be working hard to make up for it and hopefully, [they’ll] perform much better against other teams at IASAS.”
Both teams have a few weeks left until they reach the dangerous three week winter break where athletes may or may not stay fit. For many second season sports, athletes must keep in mind
this long period of not practicing every day. This is the only season separated by a break, which
means they must be able to come back into the season with only two weeks to prepare for IASAS.
We wish good luck to all the teams as they endure these next few weeks of training before the highly anticipated IASAS in Jakarta towards the end of January.
Peyton E
