Jurisdiction | United Kingdom |
---|---|
Membership | 165 |
Abbreviation | BUCS |
Founded | 2008 |
Affiliation | FISU |
Regional affiliation | EUSA |
Location | 20–24 King's Bench Street London SE1 0QX United Kingdom |
Replaced | British Universities Sports Association (BUSA) University College Sport (UCS) |
Official website | |
www | |
British Universities and Colleges Sport, commonly abbreviated as BUCS, is the governing body for higher education sport in the United Kingdom.
BUCS is responsible for organising 54 inter-university sports in the United Kingdom, as well as representative teams for the FISU World University Championships and the FISU World University Games.
BUCS is a membership organisation of over 165 universities and colleges, with six thousand teams competing across 850 leagues. Anne, Princess Royal is currently patron of BUCS.
BUCS was formed in 2008 by a merger of British Universities Sports Association (BUSA) and University College Sport (UCS).
As of 2024, BUCS organise competition across 54 sports. [1]
Certain university and college sports are not governed by BUCS for various reasons. The following is a partial list of these sports and respective competitions:
Sport | Competition(s) | Champions | ||
---|---|---|---|---|
Men's | Women's | Mixed | ||
Darts | UDUK Nationals | None | Sheffield | |
Hurling | British University Hurling Championship | |||
Ice hockey | BUIHA National Championships | Nottingham | Caledonia | None |
Kart racing | British Universities Karting Championship | None | Reading | |
Underwater hockey | BOA Student Nationals | West Yorkshire | ||
Team sports compete in BUCS leagues, with the majority of league fixtures taking place on Wednesday afternoons, which is commonly referred to as BUCS Wednesday. Wednesday afternoons are generally free from lectures to allow students to compete in sport. There are 850 leagues, with institutions across the country competing against each other to avoid relegation or win the league and gain promotion to higher leagues.
The finals of the Championship and Trophy are played at BUCS Big Wednesday. This annual single-day event showcases the Championship and Trophy finals across 16 league sports. As of 2023, [update] Big Wednesday will take place at Loughborough University. [3]
BUCS Nationals is an annual multisport event that takes place across three days. As of 2023, indoor athletics, swimming, badminton and climbing are the sports represented at BUCS Nationals. The event is held in Sheffield. [4]
Over the year, BUCS runs over 120 events for both individual and team sports.
BUCS Points are awarded to institutions based on their finishing positions in leagues and events under the BUCS marquee. The accumulation of these points determines the overall BUCS champion.
Loughborough University have topped the overall BUCS standings in each of the 14 years since its founding, including the 2023–24 season. As of 2024, no university has scored within 1000 points of Loughborough in the overall standings.
Both the 2019–20 and 2020–21 seasons were cancelled due to the COVID-19 pandemic in the United Kingdom.
University | Titles | Runners-up | Top 5 |
---|---|---|---|
Loughborough | 14 | 0 | 14 |
Durham | 0 | 7 | 12 |
Nottingham | 4 | 7 | |
Bath | 1 | 8 | |
Birmingham | 1 | 7 | |
Leeds Beckett | 1 | 4 | |
Edinburgh | 0 | 11 | |
Exeter | 7 | ||
Members of both FISU (International University Sport Federations) and EUSA (European University Sports Association), BUCS is responsible for sending a cohort of students to international events including the World University Summer & Winter Games and the European Universities Games. The British international team goes by the name of GB Students.
BUCS applies for annual funding from Sport England to support the delivery of student sport across the country. They also work with national governing bodies to develop sports within the student sector and some posts within BUCS are funded by such bodies, with the aim of developing specific student sports.
The Football Association (FA) fund projects and positions within BUCS to help develop grassroots football. With their investment, BUCS set up 167 FA Grassroot Hubs to support football and futsal in the higher education sector, benefiting over 250 thousand participants. [5]
BUCS also collaborated with the FA to create the Women's Leadership Programme, providing female students with important skills and qualities to help them in their future careers. The first cohort of leaders graduated in 2020. [6]
The BUCS Board is responsible for leading strong governance and strategic leadership within the sector. The Board is made up of the chair, five independent directors and four BUCS directors - two representing students and two representing the staff of the membership.
Chair of the Board: Vacant
Commercial Director and Senior Independent Director: Russell James
Sport and Competition Director: Katy Storie
Finance Director: Simon Wilson
EDIA Director: Vacant
Legal and Governance Director: Carrie Stephenson
Chair of BUCS Senior Managers Executive: Cathy Gallagher
Chair of BUCS Advisory Group: Chris Anthony
Student Director: Ella Williams
Student Director, Welfare Lead: George Christian
In 2019, BUCS introduced the Hall of Fame to celebrate the centenary of university sport in the United Kingdom. The Hall of Fame acknowledges individual dedication to and achievements in sport.
As of 2024, 18 athletes have been inducted into the BUCS Hall of Fame.
Inductee | University | Sport(s) | Season(s) | BUCS | Notes |
---|---|---|---|---|---|
Alison Odell CBE | Birmingham Leicester | Administrator | |||
Alun Wyn Jones OBE | Swansea | Rugby union | |||
Bill Slater CBE | Birmingham | Football | |||
Catriona Matthew OBE | Stirling | Golf | |||
Christine Ohuruogu MBE | UCL | Athletics | |||
Dame Jessica Ennis-Hill DBE | Sheffield | Athletics | |||
Dame Katherine Grainger DBE | Edinburgh | Rowing | |||
Danielle Brown MBE | Leicester | Archery | |||
David Florence | Nottingham | Canoeing | |||
Deng Yaping | Nottingham | Table tennis | |||
Eric Liddell | Edinburgh | Athletics Rugby union | |||
Jonathan Edwards CBE | Durham | Athletics | |||
Lauren Steadman MBE | Portsmouth | Swimming Paratriathlon | |||
Liz Nicholl CBE | Nottingham | Netball | |||
Rebecca Romero MBE | St Mary's | Rowing Cycling | |||
Sir Gareth Edwards CBE | Cardiff Met | Rugby union | |||
Sir Roger Bannister CH CBE | Oxford | Athletics | |||
Sophie Ingle OBE | Cardiff Met | Football | |||
Loughborough University is a public research university in the market town of Loughborough, Leicestershire, England. It has been a university since 1966, but it dates back to 1909, when Loughborough Technical Institute was founded. In March 2013, the university announced it had bought the former broadcast centre at the Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park as a second campus. The annual income of the institution for 2022–23 was £369.1 million, of which £48.3 million was from research grants and contracts, with an expenditure of £339.1 million.
University rowing in the United Kingdom began when it was introduced to Oxford in the late 18th century. The first known race at a university took place at Oxford in 1815 between Brasenose and Jesus and the first inter-university boat race, between Oxford and Cambridge, was rowed on 10 June 1829.
Heriot-Watt University Football Club is a football club based at Riccarton Campus, on the western fringes of Edinburgh. The club's first team plays in the East of Scotland League First Division. Home matches are played on a 3G synthetic pitch within the John Brydson Arena on the university campus at Riccarton. In weekend competition, the club also enters a team into the Lowlands Under-20 Development League; and another into Lothian & Edinburgh Amateur Football Association competition.
Team Durham is a student-run organisation responsible for sport at Durham University. Durham University's sports programme, run by Team Durham, has produced more professional sports people than any other UK university and has twice seen Durham named Times and Sunday Times Sports University of the Year. It has ranked in the top three institutions in British Universities and Colleges Sport (BUCS) every season since 2011–12. Eight Team Durham alumni or current athletes have won nine Olympic and Paralympic medals since 1996.
Loughborough Students' Union is the students' union serving members from Loughborough University, Loughborough College and the RNIB College Loughborough.
Exeter University Rugby Football Club (EURFC) is the University of Exeter's rugby club. The men's side boasts nine sides competing in BUCS competitions, as well as a Saturday XV, currently playing in National League 2 West – a level 4 league in the English rugby union system – following their promotion from South West Premier as champions in 2021–22. The University 1st XV compete in BUCS Super Rugby, the flagship university rugby league in the United Kingdom.
The British Universities American Football League (BUAFL) is an American football league contested by university teams in the United Kingdom as part of the British Universities and Colleges Sport (BUCS) organisation. The league was formed by the British American Football Association (BAFA), the national governing body of American football in the UK, in 2007 as the successor to the British Collegiate American Football League, after BAFA withdrew its recognition of the British Student American Football Association which ran that league. The BUAFL has been credited with reviving interest in American football in the UK.
Aberdeen University Sports Union (AUSU) is the sports union at the University of Aberdeen, Scotland. It is a constituent part of Aberdeen University Students' Association. It is not responsible for facilities and rents time for its clubs from Aberdeen Sports Village.
Edinburgh University Sports Union (EUSU) is the representative body of seventy University of Edinburgh sports clubs.
Dame Susan Catherine Campbell, Baroness Campbell of Loughborough, is a British sports administrator who was chairman of UK Sport between 2003 and 2013.
The British Universities Karting Championship, commonly abbreviated as the BUKC, is a university-based kart racing series in the United Kingdom.
Matthew Lloyd is a British Paralympian who was born with spina bifida and two club feet. He has competed in ice sledge hockey at the 2006 Winter Paralympics, in Sitting volleyball at the 2007 European Championships, and is credited with inventing the sport of Inline sledge hockey. He was born in Crawley, Sussex but grew up in Rainhill, Merseyside and later resided in Hollym, East Riding of Yorkshire. After completing a degree in Business Information Systems, Lloyd worked within the music industry, firstly as a journalist and then within the A&R department of a major record label, before going to work extensively within the sports and leisure sectors.
Edinburgh University Men's Hockey Club is the official men's field hockey club for The University of Edinburgh. It currently comprises seven men's teams, which makes it the largest men's university field hockey and sports club in the United Kingdom, with over 160 active members. It also represents the largest adult male membership for a hockey club in Scotland. Founded in 1901, it is one of the oldest university hockey clubs in the United Kingdom.
College sports or college athletics encompasses non-professional, collegiate and university-level competitive sports and games.
The Wallace Group is a grouping of eight universities in the UK that have a shared interest in promoting sports and health workshops in developing countries. The members are the University of Bath, Cardiff Metropolitan University, Durham University, the University of Edinburgh, Loughborough University, Northumbria University, the University of St Andrews and the University of Stirling. The sports which are primarily promoted are football, volleyball, basketball and netball with education workshops focused on HIV & AIDS.
The British Esports Federation is the national body for esports in the United Kingdom. It was established in March 2016 as the British Esports Association to help develop the UK's grassroots esports scene and provide an infrastructure to nurture future talent.
The British Student Taekwondo Federation (BSTF) is a national student sport federation and registered charity.
Dame Elizabeth Mary Nicholl is a British sports administrator and former netball player. She served as chief executive of UK Sport from 2010 to 2019, and is the current president of World Netball, having been re-elected for a second term of 4 years in 2023 and Chair of the World Netball Foundation, launched in 2023.
The 2021 Summer World University Games (2021年夏季世界大学生运动会), officially known as the XXXI Summer World University Games and also known as Chengdu 2021, was a multi-sport event sanctioned by the International University Sports Federation (FISU), held from 28 July to 8 August 2023 in Chengdu, Sichuan, China. It was the fourth time the Games was hosted in China. This is the first time the Games was referred to as the "Summer World University Games" rather than the "Summer Universiade."
The Oxford University men's basketballteam represents the University of Oxford in the BUCS Basketball League and the National Basketball League (NBL). The team has won 19 National Championships, making it one of the most successful university basketball teams in the United Kingdom. The team is currently coached by Greg Robertson.