Al-Hamra Schools for Girls in Jeddah organized the competition, which saw 200 girls of various grades competing. The event was dubbed the first-of-its-kind as it involves schools rather than colleges. The six girls schools that participated in the event were Al-Hamra Schools, Al-Fe-rdous Schools, My Little House Schools, Children Gardens Schools, Al-Ruwais school and Dar Al-Hanan school.  This event, said Farida Farsi, chairman of the board of directors at Al-Hamra Schools, was a creative way to introduce sports into the life of female Saudi students.

“Schoolgirls in the Kingdom need to practice sports in their daily routines because our students suffer from obesity and diabetes, and some already have cancer at an early age,” she said.

“We’re willing to hold this event every year and hope more schools will register with us because sports is healthy,” she added.

Pupils from Al-Ferdous Schools went home with six trophies winning first, second, third and fourth place in badminton, and first place in athletics. The large number of trophies they won earned them the title “Trophy Collectors.”  “The students spent a lot of time training for this competition and I believe they deserved to win in every competition,” said Fawziya Al-Yazeedi, supervisor of the Al-Ferdous team.

“Our students are willing to enter all kinds of sports competitions; they believe they can win good positions. They are already training for the next competitions,” she added.

My Little House Schools won seven trophies in basketball, athletics and swimming gaining the title “The Black Stallion.”

“I believe that schoolgirls need these kinds of activities to use their energy in a sporty and festive way because sports and especially competitions train people to adopt the sporting spirit,” said Thurayya Murad, supervisor of the team from My Little House Schools. “This is a good opportunity for students from different schools to meet and compete against each other in friendly and sociable events,” she added.

Sally Salem, sports coach at Al-Ferdous Schools, said there should be more tournaments and contests between schools as they help increase interest in sports. “These kinds of friendly competitions should be held more often and more schools should join in because students spend their days focusing on studying; it is competitions like this that allow them to compete against each other in a friendly environment,” she said.