26 Student Landscape Gardeners Battle It Out 10th May 2010

26 students from colleges and industry battled it out in varying conditions over 4 days at Malvern Spring Gardening Show 6-9th May.

The WorldSkills UK Landscape Gardening Competition, sponsored by Marshalls, run by The British Association of Landscape Industries (BALI) in Association with UKSkills has proven challenging for the 26 Advanced level students who were put under pressure to build a 2x3m complex garden within 6 hours.

The top 5 students (in order) from Heat 1 of the competition are:
Ryan Neveu from George-Stone Gardens who studied at Hartpury College.
Darren Cumming, (commercial entry) from APL member The Essential Earthmen
Ben Skinner, from Chichester College down in West Sussex
David Harvey (commercial entry) The Essential Earthmen
Arran John Tricker, an Individual entry who studied at Sparsholt College Hampshire

Angela Radley, Project manager of the competition from BALI commented “It was fantastic to see so many entries this year. All competitors at Malvern gave it there all really trying to maximise what points they could get from the judges. We had some very cold wet conditions; all credit to the competitors, staff and judges for a keeping a cheery and competitive atmosphere.

This year we introduced live commentary to the competition, which proved very popular with spectators. Many asked questions about the competition and the competitors; they thought the talent of competitors, some as young as 16, was incredible and didn’t realise that such a competition existed.

Congratulations to Ryan for securing 1st place on the leader board. We love coming to the Malvern Spring and Autumn Shows and look forward to coming back for the National Final of the competition here in September. “

There are 37 competitors in total this year, to find out how they are all getting on please visit the WorldSkills UK pages of www.bali.org.uk

Editor information:
Angela Radley- UK Landscape Skills Project Manager
BALI, Landscape House , Stoneleigh Park, Warwickshire, CV8 2LG

Tel: 02476 690 333, DD: 0247 66 90333
Mob: 0780 0573351 Email: aradley@bali.org.uk

Additional Information

The landscape gardening competition is part of a set of over 70 skills competitions called WorldSkills UK which are run UK wide, in association with UK Skills. Every year the landscape gardening competition attracts, on average, 50 competitors from colleges and industry. Competing within regional heats; those scoring highest are invited to complete in a national final.

The 2010 regional heats will be hosted as a live feature of: Malvern Spring Gardening Show and Gardening Scotland (funded by the Scottish Government). Malvern Autumn Show will host the national final. Attracting over 180,000 visitors between them, these venues provide an excellent publicity platform to showcase products and skills to the horticulture and landscape industry.

Outstanding national finalists across the UK may then be considered for inclusion in Team UK. The UK compete in the biennial International Worldskills competition where almost 1200 competitors from around 50 countries compete to win medals. This year at WorldSkills Calgary 2009, the Landscape Gardening team won a medallion for excellence.

The next International Worldskills competition will be held in London 2011 between 5-8th October and 2010 is the last year people can enter to be in with a chance of competing with Team UK in front of a home crowd.

For more information about the World Skills Landscape Gardening Competition UK please visit the BALI website at www.bali.org.uk or call 02476 690 333

About WorldSkills UK

• WorldSkxills UK is the name for the UK’s premier set of skills competitions. These competitions are open to all ages.
• Competitions run every year in around 70 skills within these five main sectors

Built Environment, Cultural and Creative Arts, Engineering, Information Technology and Business Administration, Professional, Social, Public and Hospitality Services.

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