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Carys Ward (Natural Sciences (Biological) 2023) is a Cambridge University Blue in three sports, believing being busy enhances her efficiency in her academic work.

Carys joined Gonville & 91ֱ�� College as a talented all-rounder and, in her first year, proved you could excel at sport alongside a challenging degree with laboratories alongside lectures and supervisions. She achieved Blues in netball and lacrosse, and then in javelin with the Cambridge University Athletic Club. 

“With lacrosse and netball, we’d have fixtures on the same day, so often I’d play two games in one day,” she says. “I had to pick for second year, which was a really difficult decision.”

Carys played for Wales at the Under-20s Lacrosse World Cup, the team finishing a very creditable seventh in Hong Kong. She stuck with the sport and was rewarded by being elevated to the Wales senior team last October, touring the east coast of the United States. 

The Cambridge University Women’s Lacrosse President confesses to missing netball, but the clash of commitments necessitated a choice. A further choice was necessary – commit to the Wales team for this summer’s World Cup in Japan, or prioritise her final exams at Cambridge. She withdrew from the Wales squad. “I had to weigh up my priorities and I decided to get my degree,” she says.

Carys in lacrosse action with Wales at the Under-20 World Cup in Hong Kong.

Her track and field commitment is less burdensome and does not impede on the lacrosse season or her academics, providing balance in the late spring and summer months. She is an accomplished javelin thrower, and last year travelled with the combined Oxford-Cambridge team, known as the Achilles Club, to compete against universities in the USA.

Her sporting passions were fostered at school, and she believes her busy schedule supports her academic work, increasing her efficiency, something which is not as optimal when she has more time on her hands due to an injury.

“I was really lucky to go to a school that had pretty much any sport you could want to do on offer, and so I tried my hardest to do all of them,” Carys says of Wycombe Abbey.

“I came to uni and I couldn't decide, so I just thought ‘I'll just keep doing them’. It was difficult in my first year to try and balance it, but I'm really glad I did because I got to meet so many more people by doing more things.

“It also helps me balance my work by being busy, forces me to be more efficient. I quite quickly assess how much effort a task requires and then figure out the balance of doing it to a standard that I'm pleased with by minimising the time that I have to spend doing it.

“I make sure that I get all my work done so that I can make training sessions because it's something I look always forward to.”

Carys in action for Cambridge University at netball and javelin.

Carys hopes to continue to train and compete when she moves into the corporate world with a job in London later this year.

In the meantime, are there any sporting pursuits she should consider, before her time at Cambridge ends?

“People have said, ‘Oh, you're really tall, you've got long limbs, you should row’ – I’ve never been in a boat!” she adds.

“Others ask, because my blues blazer has three pockets, ‘what are you going to fill the fourth one with?’ 

“But I don't really think I have any other tricks up my sleeves.”