SportsAid

Hollie Arnold

Matthew Baptiste

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Matt threw a personal best this season in the discus with a distance of 51.96m at the National Junior Athletics League meet in Cambridge.

In 2009 he hopes to compete at the Indoor AAA, Indoor South of England Championships and the European Junior Championships in Serbia.

Matt is currently studying for his A levels at college and finds his biggest challenge is staying on top of his work load.

I don't plan to failMatthew Baptiste

Matthew Johnson

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Matthew Johnson is not so much making a splash but tidal waves in the swimming pool, leaving competitors at junior and senior level chasing his feet. He caught everyone’s attention at the British National Championships in 2006 emphatically claiming seven British National titles. He has since gone on to prove himself as having true and unrivalled talent, breaking nearly every record in the book. In 2007 he moved up a gear to claim nine British National titles and in 2008 he surpassed everyone’s expectations with 10 titles to his name – taking home gold in every event that he entered.

This year Matthew has been supported by SportsAid thank to the ASDA Sporting Chance scheme and is linked to his local store.

His outstanding form in the past three years has seen him put his name to 14 British Age Group records holding most of the all time fastest swims for the 10, 11, 12 and 13 year categories. He aims to carry on this trend with his eye on breaking records in the next age group before he turns 14 in April. He has also qualified for the British Open Championships which has never been achieved by a 13 year old.

Outside of the pool Matthew has been recognised for his achievements being chosen as Top Boy at the British National for the last three years and awarded Best Junior Boy at the BBC Sports Awards in Yorkshire.

Due to age restrictions, Matthew is not yet competing at International level but we look forward to seeing him progress on to this!

To find out more about ASDA Sporting Chance visit www.asda-sportingchance.co.uk.

Oliver Golding

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Oliver, who is supported by SportsAid London partner Prudential, reached the quarter-finals of the Grade A International Casablanca Junior Cup in Mexico in January.

His good start to 2010 is continuing from what was a very successful 2009. Highlights included:

Oct 2009: Reaching the final of the junior Davis Cup in Mexico.
Sep 2009: Became the youngest ever British no.1 junior player at age 15.
Sep 2009: Became the youngest competitor at the US Open beating Japanese WC Takeshi Endo 6-1, 7-5 in qualifying. Only a handful of players have ever played at the US Open before their 16th birthday.
Aug 2009: Reached the final of the ITF Grade 3 US International Hard-court Championship and last 16 of the Grade 1 Canadian Open.
July 2009: Received a wild card into Junior Wimbledon, lost a very tight match 6-4 7-6 to sixth seed Gianni Mina, who is the French no.1 and Junior French Open finalist
June 2009: Received a wild card into Roehampton ITF event in 22 June 2009
June 2009: Beat top seed Mate Zsiga 6-3, 6-3 and reached his first ITF G2 final in Budapest
May 2009 : Beat Richard Gabb 6-4, 6-7, 6-4 at the Newcastle F7 Futures tournament and became the youngest player in Great Britain to receive an ATP world ranking.
Jan 2009: Won the ITF G4 Vasteras International in Sweden beating top seed Tobias Blomgren 7-5, 6-3.
Jan 2009: Reached his first ITF G4 final, losing to top seed Andrei Vasilevski.

Keep an eye out for Oliver this year. You can also visit his website, http://www.olivergolding.co.uk/, to keep up to date.

Phillip Cochrane

Athlete page

At just 16 years old, wheelchair tennis ace Philip Cochrane recently won his first Senior Men’s singles title on the ITF World Tour. Supported by the Lloyds TSB Local Heroes programme, Philip beat three seeded players including the top seeded Russian to take the title.

The event, held in Lithuania, attracted players from six countries and Philip outclassed all his opponents, not dropping a set in the whole tournament. In the final against the Russian, ranked over 130 places higher than Phillip and 32 years his senior, he won the match 6-2, 6-4.

Philip is continuing his good form from last season when he took the British Open Junior Boys title, won all his singles matches in the World Team Cup and became a World Junior Master Doubles Champion.

After getting his GCSE’s out of the way Philip will be concentrating on his next event that takes place in Morocco in July.