Wales High School powers up with School Games Weightlifting

British Weight Lifting (BWL) is pleased to share that Wales High School has become the first school in the country to deliver weightlifting as part of the School Games programme.

Your School Games is a government-funded initiative that provides competitive sporting opportunities for young people from Years 3 to 13 across the UK. The programme aims to promote physical activity, personal development, and inclusion by offering meaningful opportunities for students of all abilities through intra-school, inter-school, and national level competition.

Following the recent inclusion of weightlifting within the School Games sport offer, Wales High School, located in Sheffield, has taken a leading role by becoming the first school to deliver structured weightlifting sessions using the official School Games resources.

To support the delivery, Wales High School has partnered with local BWL-affiliated club mettle. The club has worked closely with the school to provide expertise, guidance, and coaching support, helping to ensure students experience safe, engaging, and high-quality weightlifting sessions.

This milestone represents an important step forward in expanding access to weightlifting within schools, providing young people with opportunities to develop strength, confidence, and fundamental movement skills, while inspiring the next generation of weightlifters.

BWL is also pleased to reveal that our valued partner, Eleiko, has agreed to supply 50 schools with wooden technique bars to support schools in the delivery of this program.

Mathieu Gratereau, International Sales Director – Professional Sports, Eleiko, commented:

“Eleiko is proud to support the School Games programme in partnership with BWL. Creating access to high-quality equipment at grassroots level is fundamental to developing safe, confident and technically proficient young athletes. Investing in schools is investing in the future of weightlifting.”

Martin Hacking Head of PE, Wales High School, commented:

‘Wales High School is very excited to be a host school for the new School Games weightlifting programme.  This is a fantastic opportunity for our students to develop their physical literacy and confidence in terms of lifting weights as part of a progressive fitness programme.  

Mettle have been relentless in their determination to pass on their expertise and passion for this sport providing new opportunities for Wales' students who have grasped this opportunity, literally with both hands.

The School Games weightlifting programme will provide a fantastic opportunity for our students to get out of their comfort zone, try something exciting and new and improve their skills and fitness.

We would also like to thank Eleiko’s support for the programme through their extremely generous donation to the school of 20 wooden bars.  This equipment will significantly enhance the delivery of this programme and help make it sustainable for current and future Wales students as we look to grow this exciting initiative within our school community and make it part of our day-to-day provision.’

Dave Hemborough, Head Coach at mettle, commented:

‘The Youth Sport Trust School Games Weightlifting programme is just brilliant. British Weight Lifting have produced a great guide that supports teachers to introduce pupils to fitness and weightlifting in an enjoyable, accessible and flexible way. For mettle to support in the delivery of this programme at Wales High School is an honour. We'll take the first ever cohort of 30+ pupils through a 10-week programme with 100s and maybe 1000s to follow.

We aim to provide a great enrichment experience to these pupils to give them a positive relationship with exercise and lifting weights for life. All pupils who go through the programme will receive support to join mettle to continue their weightlifting journey with us be that just for fun, for fitness or for competition.’

Whilst Wales High School is being supported by a BWL affiliated club, the resource has been designed to be delivered by any school on their own and does not require qualified coaches and only utilises inexpensive equipment. 

BWL would like to thank Youth Sport Trust for including the sport of weightlifting in the School Games program and for supporting BWL in producing the resource for schools.

Visit the school games weightlifting website here

Visit the Eleiko website here