Bournemouth 7s Festival is a sport and music festival, and takes place over three days across the Spring

Bank Holiday A bank holiday is a national public holiday in the United Kingdom, Republic of Ireland and the Crown Dependencies. The term refers to all public holidays in the United Kingdom, be they set out in statute, declared by royal proclamation or held ...

Weekend on the South Coast of England. The festival has been celebrated as the "Sporting Glastonbury" due its unique combination of sport and live music. Since being founded in 2008 by Dodge Woodall and Fleur Woodall, Bournemouth 7s Festival has grown to see over 30,000 people attending each year.

The sports

Each year over 400 teams come together for their sports tour and compete across a large variety of elite and social sports tournaments. The festival currently has five sports:

rugby Rugby may refer to: Sport * Rugby football in many forms: ** Rugby league: 13 players per side *** Masters Rugby League *** Mod league *** Rugby league nines *** Rugby league sevens *** Touch (sport) *** Wheelchair rugby league ** Rugby union: 1 ...

netball Netball is a ball sport played on a court by two teams of seven players. It is among a rare number of sports which have been created exclusively for female competitors. The sport is played on indoor and outdoor netball courts and is specifical ...

dodgeball Dodgeball is a team sport in which players on two teams try to throw balls and hit opponents, while avoiding being hit themselves. The objective of each team is to eliminate all members of the opposing team by hitting them with thrown balls, cat ...

hockey Hockey is a term used to denote a family of various types of both summer and winter team sports which originated on either an outdoor field, sheet of ice, or dry floor such as in a gymnasium. While these sports vary in specific rules, numbers o ...

, and

CrossFit CrossFit is a branded fitness regimen that involves constantly varied functional movements performed at high intensity. The method was developed by Greg Glassman, who founded CrossFit with Lauren Jenai in 2000, with CrossFit its registered trad ...

. The festival launched with two sports in 2008, rugby 7s and netball 7s. In 2013, the sporting offering was expanded with the introduction of dodgeball. This trend continued as hockey was included in 2014.

Volleyball Volleyball is a team sport in which two teams of six players are separated by a net. Each team tries to score points by grounding a ball on the other team's court under organized rules. It has been a part of the official program of the Summ ...

and

ultimate Frisbee Ultimate, originally known as ultimate Frisbee, is a non-contact team sport played with a frisbee flung by hand. Ultimate was developed in 1968 by AJ Gator in Maplewood, New Jersey. Although ultimate resembles many traditional sports in its ath ...

featured from 2018 and were sports at Bournemouth 7s for three years. CrossFit, hosted by the National Fitness Games, is now the festival's fifth sport, having been introduced in 2021. The 65-acre festival site accommodates each of the sports, with a total of eight rugby pitches, 12 netball courts, two hockey pitches, two dodgeball arenas, and one CrossFit arena.

The festival

Since 2008, the festival has expanded the entertainment, arenas and music offering year-on-year. The festival now offers 12 themed arenas, all of which offer a different genre of music, including

house A house is a single-unit residential building. It may range in complexity from a rudimentary hut to a complex structure of wood, masonry, concrete or other material, outfitted with plumbing, electrical, and heating, ventilation, and air condi ...

, hip hop,

bassline Bassline (also known as a bass line or bass part) is the term used in many styles of music, such as blues, jazz, funk, Dub music, dub and electronic music, electronic, traditional music, traditional, or classical music for the low-pitched Part ( ...

, cheese, and

drum and bass Drum and bass (also written as drum & bass or drum'n'bass and commonly abbreviated as D&B, DnB, or D'n'B) is a genre of electronic dance music characterized by fast breakbeats (typically 165–185 beats per minute) with heavy bass and sub-ba ...

, to name a few. Past headliners include

Ella Eyre Ella McMahon (born 1 April 1994), known professionally as Ella Eyre, is a British singer and songwriter. She is known for her collaborations with Rudimental on their UK number-one single "Waiting All Night" (2013), which won the 2014 Brit Awar ...

Professor Green Stephen Paul Manderson (born 27 November 1983), better known by his stage name Professor Green or simply Pro Green, is an English rapper, singer, songwriter, actor, television personality and mental health activist from London. Growing up on ...

Example Example may refer to: * '' exempli gratia'' (e.g.), usually read out in English as "for example" * .example, reserved as a domain name that may not be installed as a top-level domain of the Internet ** example.com, example.net, example.org, ex ...

MistaJam Peter Dalton (born 19 January 1983), known professionally as MistaJam, is a British DJ and radio presenter. He is known for presenting radio shows on BBC Radio 1 and BBC Radio 1Xtra from 2005 to 2020; since 2020 he has presented on Capital and C ...

, and

Fatman Scoop Isaac Freeman III (born August 6, 1971), better known by his stage name Fatman Scoop, is an American rapper, promoter and radio personality famed for his on-stage rough, raw loud voice. He is known for the song "Be Faithful", which topped the ch ...

. They have been joined by other artists such as Majestic,

Artful Dodger Jack Dawkins, better known as the Artful Dodger, is a character in Charles Dickens's 1838 novel '' Oliver Twist''. The Dodger is a pickpocket, so called for his skill and cunning in that occupation. He is the leader of the gang of child criminals ...

James Haskell James Andrew Welbon Haskell (born 2 April 1985) is an English former rugby union player who played for Wasps RFC and Northampton Saints in the Aviva Premiership, and internationally for England. In August 2019 he announced he would become a ...

, Fred V,

René LaVice René LaVice is a Canadian electronic music producer, DJ and singer. Biography His song "The Calling", featuring Ivy Mairi, entered the UK Singles Chart at number 118 following a placement on BBC Radio 1's A List playlist. The song also featur ...

, FooR,

Jaguar Skills Jaguar Skills is a British DJ who since 2002 has performed multi-genre, cut-n-paste style DJ mixes. He has released hundreds of mixtapes through various outlets, including BBC Radio 1 and BBC Radio 1Xtra and had a weekly 10-minute mix on ''The ...

, and many more. As well as sports tournaments and music there is a variety of stalls, fairground rides, and bars. In the day, the VIP Colourseum arena combines games such as

sumo wrestling is a form of competitive full-contact wrestling where a ''rikishi'' (wrestler) attempts to force his opponent out of a circular ring (''dohyō'') or into touching the ground with any body part other than the soles of his feet (usually by thr ...

and

beer pong Beer pong, also known as Beirut, is a drinking game in which players throw a ping pong ball across a table with the intent of landing the ball in a cup of beer on the other end. The game typically consists of opposing teams of two or more player ...

, and in the evening it offers entertainment and live DJs. The V.VIP arena offers a private area where ticket holders can enjoy pitch-side views of the competitive rugby, a private bar and more DJs and live entertainment. Various celebrities from

Harry Redknapp Henry James Redknapp (born 2 March 1947) is an English former football manager and player. He has previously managed AFC Bournemouth, West Ham United, Portsmouth, Southampton, Tottenham Hotspur, Queens Park Rangers and Birmingham City. In his ...

Lewis Moody Lewis Walton Moody MBE (born 12 June 1978 in Ascot) is an English retired rugby union player. He played for Leicester Tigers and Bath Rugby and was part of the 2003 World Cup winning side. Moody is known for the enthusiasm with which he pla ...

have been seen enjoying themselves here.

The history

2008

Bournemouth 7s first took place in May 2008 with 8,000 people attending and 96 rugby teams competing. It quickly became known for being an end of season rugby tour.

2009 - 2012

The festival was extended from 2 days to 3 days. Attendance grew to 20,000 and 300 teams competed. After the success of the taster netball sessions in 2008, netball tournaments became a permanent fixture. In 2011,

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became the first headline sponsor.

2013 - 2016

Dodgeball was introduced as the festivals third sport in 2013, followed closely by the addition of hockey in 2014 which brought the total number of teams competing to 360. The number of festival goers reached 25,000 and 2016 saw Bournemouth 7s’ first headline performance by

2017 - 2019

The festival reached its capacity of 30,000 people on its 10th anniversary. 2018 was the year of big change for Bournemouth 7s as volleyball and ultimate frisbee were introduced, two new arenas were established and

headlined on the Saturday. A further two arenas, Funky Forest and Ya Mum's House, were added in 2019 to take the total to 12. The Saturday was headlined by

2020 - 2021

Bournemouth 7s Festival 2020 would’ve been held from 29 to 31 May, however was cancelled due to the ongoing

COVID-19 pandemic The COVID-19 pandemic, also known as the coronavirus pandemic, is an ongoing global pandemic of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2). The novel virus was first identif ...

. The 2021 festival was scheduled to take place on the usual May Bank Holiday weekend, but had to be moved to the August Bank Holiday weekend due to COVID-19 restrictions. Taking place from 27 to 29 August, the 14th edition saw CrossFit make its debut as well as Bingo Lingo. Records were broken for the number of attendees and the number of teams competing, of which there were over 400. Ella Eyre headlined on the Saturday.

The venue

Bournemouth 7s Festival takes place at Bournemouth University Sports Campus in

Christchurch Christchurch ( ; mi, Ōtautahi) is the largest city in the South Island of New Zealand and the seat of the Canterbury Region. Christchurch lies on the South Island's east coast, just north of Banks Peninsula on Pegasus Bay. The Avon River / ...

, just east of

Bournemouth Bournemouth () is a coastal resort town in the Bournemouth, Christchurch and Poole council area of Dorset, England. At the 2011 census, the town had a population of 183,491, making it the largest town in Dorset. It is situated on the Southern ...

. It is situated on a 65-acre site, which houses the main festival arena, the sports pitches, the campsite and Glamping. The festival hire the land from

Bournemouth University Bournemouth University is a public university in Bournemouth, England, with its main campus situated in neighbouring Poole. The university was founded in 1992; however, the origins of its predecessor date back to the early 1900s. The univer ...

, both of whom rely on a strong partnership to work around the challenges a multi-use venue poses.

The founders

Bournemouth 7s Festival was created by Dodge and Fleur Woodall, who still privately own the event today. Dodge Woodall was introduced to the events industry while at

Loughborough University Loughborough University (abbreviated as ''Lough'' or ''Lboro'' for post-nominals) is a public research university in the market town of Loughborough, Leicestershire, England. It has been a university since 1966, but it dates back to 1909, when L ...

, where he created two student nightclub brands and held 1,500 events over a 10-year period. In 2007 there were fewer festivals taking place in the UK, and having identified a market for a multi-sports and music event, Woodall saw the opportunity to use his skill set to launch a festival. His aim was to create an ‘unrivalled experience with like-minded sports people and party goers’. Flyers were the main form of promotion until four months prior to the first festival, when

Facebook Facebook is an online social media and social networking service owned by American company Meta Platforms. Founded in 2004 by Mark Zuckerberg with fellow Harvard College students and roommates Eduardo Saverin, Andrew McCollum, Dustin M ...

hit the UK and meant a much wider audience could be reached organically. The launch of Bournemouth 7s Festival saw 96 sports teams compete and 8,000 general admission tickets were bought on the day, at the gates. Woodall is still the CEO of the festival and his wife, Fleur Woodall, is the Financial Director.

Awards

Bournemouth 7s Festival has received the following awards: * Event Production Awards 2022 - Sporting Event of the Year * Event Production Awards 2019 - Sporting Event of the Year * NOEA Awards 2018 - Sporting Event of the Year * NOEA Awards 2018 - Large Festival of the Year * Bournemouth Tourism Awards 2017 - The Great Time Out * NOEA Awards 2017 - Sporting Event of the Year

References

{{Reflist Sports festivals in the United Kingdom