WHILE Jersey have 28 athletes bracing themselves for the start of competitive action at the Commonwealth Games today, there is another name linked to Jersey’s success in Games past who also begins their quest for glory in Birmingham.
Lucy Turmel will be representing England in both the singles and doubles in squash, starting in the women’s round of 32 tomorrow after receiving a bye from today’s first round.
Ranked number 28 in the world, she may have been born and bred in Ipswich but Turmel has family who she visits regularly on the Island.
And, not only that, she becomes the third member of the Turmel family to compete in the Games, one of whom achieved Jersey’s first-ever medal back in 1962.
That was Bert who won bronze in the Games in Perth as a welterweight boxer.
Four years before that, Bert’s brother George was among Jersey’s first ever Games contingent, in Cardiff, fighting as a lightweight.
A third brother, Frank, is Lucy’s grandfather. Her own father, Frank Jr, was also a boxer during his career in the army, even fighting a future world champion in Nigel Benn.
Turmel will have her work cut out to replicate Bert’s achievements, with a strong field from the Commonwealth countries in her event. Her compatriots Sarah-Jane Perry and Georgina Kennedy are both top ten world- ranked players, while New Zealander Joelle King is ranked number five.
But at just 22, and the youngest member of England’s squash team, her Commonwealth Games dreams are unlikely to begin and end in Birmingham this week.
‘It is my first Commonwealth Games so I don’t know what to expect but it is going to be massive,’ said Turmel. ‘I’ve worked really hard to get to this point. It has been a huge goal of mine and it wasn’t easy to get here.’
