The college's sports academy is used to celebrating top of the league places, team and individual gold medals and other sporting accolades.

This year however, is proving to be exceptional with top spots and final places right across the board for over eight sports providing a real buzz across the college and within the popular sports, leisure and tourism faculty.

Exeter College’s 1st XV elite men’s rugby team, only just crowned as the Express and Echo's amateur team of the year, are now also hailed as Champions of the AoC Sport Premier Rugby Union League being two points above their nearest rival South Gloucester and Stroud College with a game in hand. The team are now heading to Stourbridge RFC in the AoC British Colleges Premier Cup Final playing against either Coleg Llandrillo or Oaklands College at the end of April after having beaten Coleg y Cymoedd 34-17 in the semi final. The team are also Wales and South West league winners and will play either the winner or runner up of the North and Midlands Leagues on Wednesday 22nd April. The successful team, many of whom played in the Nat West Vase Cup final last year at Twickenham, are also representing South West Colleges in 7’s at the National Colleges Championships in Bath at the end of March

The Badminton mixed team were also crowned AoC National Cup winners after they travelled to High Wycombe’s Badminton High Performance Centre in Buckinghamshire and beat Cirencester College 6 – 4 following their semi final triumph against Bilborough College in Birmingham.

The 7 strong Netball Academy team have also reached the final of the AoC Sport National Cup and will play the winner of SEEVIC Womens’s 1 v Greenhead College Women’s 1 at Wolverhampton University at the end of April after beating Truro College 47 – 44 in the semi final at the Riverside in Exeter this week. The 1st team are currently in 2nd place in the AoC Sport Elite netball Super League and the team, representing the South West, finished 4th at the National Schools event in Bournemouth.

Hockey has had an excellent season despite being a relatively new Academy for the college. The men’s team sit in second place in the AoC Sport Category 2 league and will represent the South West Colleges at the National Colleges Championships at the end of March in Bath. The women’s team also sit in second place and the mixed hockey team’s win against Farnborough College 2-1 this week in the semi final means they are heading to Abbeydale Sports Park on April 29th meeting for the AoC National final The team are also celebrating sending six students to represent England Colleges this season.

The Basketball Academy, developed as a partnership with Exeter Eagles and Exeter Nomads, narrowly missed out at the Exeter and District Basketball League play-offs losing 71-61 to Exmouth Jesters men's at the weekend but went on to win 74-56 against its strong rival of Truro College this week keeping their second place in the AoC Sport South West Category 2 league.

Meanwhile the college’s football academy team is in second place in the league with 3 games in hand with the women’s team heading to Bath at the end of March representing South West colleges in the National Colleges Championships. The women’s team are also in the process of gaining an official partnership with Exeter City Ladies FC, helping to raise the profile and standard of women’s football.

The colleges’ Mixed Martial Arts Academy continues to grow and the squad scooped a silver and two bronze medals at the Brazilian Jiu Jitsu Junior national Championships at the beginning of March, whilst the Golf Academy finished fourth in the ISGA league with two of the team representing South West Colleges at the national Colleges Championships in Bath at the end of March.

And it’s not just team sports that are excelling in the Sports Academy. The elite academy is proud to have a world record holder in its midst. Local powerlifter Shachar Head who trains in the college’s sports academy has just returned from the British Drug Free Powerlifting competition in Stafford lifting an impressive 157.5kg squat and massive 175kg deadlift – breaking British, European and World records in the teenage 18-19 class with Shachar also coming away with the title 'Best Unequipped Female Squat' which makes her the number 1 pound for pound squatter in the country.

“This has been a brilliant season for so many of the sports in our academy this year and could get even better with all the finals on the horizon,” said Pete Chapman, head of sport, leisure and tourism “We were all really proud of our rugby team that got to the Nat West Vase final last year but this year all the other sports teams have been equally hard working and successful and to have got into 4 AoC national finals is exceptional as well as 45 of our students have been picked to represent South West Colleges at the National Colleges Championships. In the year when the college has opened its new Sports Hub in Exwick as well as about to finish its new Sports Hall in the centre of the city – these outstanding sports results are another reason to celebrate the commitment of staff, students and our partners to excellence in sports in the college and the community.”