ATHLETES from Reading enjoyed a fruitful day in Bath as they walked away with four BUCS Championship titles between them.

Taking place at the University of Bath, BUCS Big Wednesday saw hundreds of students from 14 sports descend on the West Country for an action-packed day of sport.

The event saw the culmination of this season’s sport competitions, with teams from more than 800 leagues having battled it out for a berth in the season finale.

Harry Perry led his Durham University side to another win in the men’s lacrosse final, while Maria Tsaptsinos and Liam McTiernan were victorious in the women’s and men’s table tennis for the University of Nottingham, and Lucie Daman brought home gold from the hockey for the University of Birmingham Final year economics student Perry, formerly of Reading Grammar School, captained Durham to victory last year, and in his new role as club president, played a large part again in helping his side to a 12-9 victory over Nottingham Trent in the men’s lacrosse showpiece.

Perry and co had trailed 7-4 at one point, but went on an 8-2 scoring run to secure victory.

“It’s a bit of a relief, every year we make it hard for ourselves,” Perry said. “I’ve been part of the first team for three years and Trent are certainly the best team I’ve ever played.

“They’re well organised and always come at us from the first whistle, so to get a win over them – even though we’ve already had one this season – is quite a relief. We do this to ourselves quite a lot, we are slow starters, it’s just something we can’t seem to shake.

“But Durham has got a fantastic pedigree for lacrosse and that’s the 93rd BUCS win in a row now, so we always back ourselves, no matter what the score is, to get the win.”

Tsaptsinos and McTiernan both represent the University of Nottingham and enjoyed 3-0 and 10-2 victories over Durham University and Nottingham Trent respectively.

And former Abbey School pupil Tsaptsinos admitted the sporting set up at her university played a large part in her choosing to go there in the first place.

“BUCS has been fun, it’s been good to get travelling across the country. It’s fun to visit other universities, see other people, make a lot of friends and it’s just enjoyable,” said the 19-year-old.

“I get along well with my team mate Jenny, so being alongside her for the season makes it all very fun.

“I played last year and we won it then too. Obviously winning it twice in a row is a good feeling but that is what we are here to do.

“That is why I went to the University of Nottingham, there is a great table tennis set up here.”

On the hockey pitch it was a fifth successive women’s win for the University of Birmingham, captain Daman playing in the last three.

“We didn’t make it easy for ourselves.

“We got a goal pretty early on (through Rio Olympic champion, and Reading player, Lily Owsley) but Loughborough were very much still in the game all the way until the end,” said former Abbey School pupil Daman.

“It was pretty tough, so credit to them for a great game of hockey, but I’m glad we came out on top in the end.

“BUCS Big Wednesday has been great. There are loads of teams here. We’ve got the ladies’ rugby team down watching us, it’s really cool when other teams can come and support.

“It makes such a difference to us. I’m going to miss BUCS too much to think about right now, or I’ll probably start crying.”

British Universities & Colleges Sport (BUCS) is the national governing body for Higher Education (HE) sport in the UK, organising leagues and competitions for more than 150 institutions across 52 different sports. BUCS has over 800 leagues across the country, with BUCS Big Wednesday the culmination for premier divisions each year.