Four Upper Sixth physicists travelled to Liverpool University to take part in the annual Liverpool Physics Olympics on Saturday 14^th October. The competition involved 32 North West schools and colleges who each had to complete five different physics-related challenges plus a Fermi quiz.

We were delighted to win the ‘gravitational fields’ round, and even more happy when it was announced that we had won silver medals overall (and t-shirts and mugs!) against strong competition from 32 other North West schools and colleges.

In the course of the day, we had to work as a team to transmit a message using Morse code, calculate the density of an ant, the spacing of a diffraction grating using experimentation, solve a difficult problem about the alignment of planets in gravitational fields and, finally, guide a blindfolded team member through an obstacle course without using verbal communication. This last activity was probably the highlight of the day for us!

All in all, it was an extremely enjoyable day, and we are all very glad we got the chance to take part and apply our physics skills in such a variety of situations.

By Katie , Sasha, Iyal and Isobel