Devon games to inspire

Formally know as the Devon Youth Games – the change of name is due to the support and funding from the Regional Educational Legacy in Arts and Youth Sport (RELAYS) Visit the herda-sw website for more details.

The 2009 games will be hosted by North Devon in partnership with RELAYS and will be taking place in Barnstaple on Sunday 5 July.

Plymouth will once again be taking teams to compete at the games with the hope of successfully defending our title. This Olympic style event features a variety of sporting competitions for 8 to 15 year olds

History of Devon Youth Games

The Youth Games were developed as part of Sport England’s Active Sports Programme, to create a coordinated national programme of sport, and in most cases were organised on a county basis.

In 1999 and 2000 the Youth Games incorporated Devon and Cornwall and were held at a variety of venues in Exeter. In 2000 the winners from each sporting event went forward to the grand finals of the Millennium Youth Games held in Southampton. This was a four day multi-sport event that saw over 6,500 youngsters from 52 youth games across the country taking part.

In 2001, Devon and Cornwall decided to host their own separate games, and so the Devon Youth Games began. This event has gone from strength to strength and is now an important fixture in the counties sporting calendar.

The games aim to:

• celebrate youth sport
• provide meaningful activities for young people
• provide a focus and tangible outcome for sports development work
• create a spirit of friendly co-operation between authorities
• demonstrate and promote the value of sports development
• provide a new level of competition for young people with sporting potential, under county level
• encourage the development of links between schools, clubs, governing bodies of sport, leisure departments and the voluntary sports clubs to obtain maximum opportunity for the development of sport for young people

Barnstaple - Sunday 5 July

Trial dates for the above activities will appear here shortly. For further information please contact the Sports Development Team on 01752 307140.

Previous overall local authority and fair play winners

The presentation of the fair play trophy has been an annual feature since 1999 and the overall local authority winner’s trophy since 2001.

Points are awarded at the end of each event based on fair play and final placing. The trophies are presented at the closing ceremony to the local authorities who have shown the best fair play and performed the best overall.

Devon Youth Ability Games

Plymouth hosted the inaugural County Games in 2003, following a successful Special Schools Football Festival the year before. On the day 17 school teams from across Devon took part in Football, Tennis, Rowing, Goalball and Boccia, and for the first time this year athletics and badminton. Prior to this event all participating schools received football coaching sessions from Devon County Council

The 2008 winners

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