Great Britain goalball star Joe Roper is eager to give young athletes the support he never had at this year’s 2024 School Games National Finals.

Roper, 26, will join 25 current and former athletes as a mentor at Loughborough University for this year’s event School Games which takes place between 29 August and 1 September, with Paris 2024 medallists Adam Peaty, Alex Yee and Tom Pidcock among the event’s star-studded alumni.

Roper followed his older brother Dan in representing his country, but he longed for a more experienced guide when starting out in the sport and that was why he decided to give his time and help budding archer Lewis Bodkin.

The School Games National Finals is a biennial four-day multisport event for young athletes of school age and is funded by Sport England National Lottery Funding and backed by all the Home Country Sports Councils and UK Sport.

This year’s School Games National Finals are the 16th since the inaugural event in Glasgow in 2006 and take place as part of an amazing summer of sport including the EUROs and the Paris 2024 Olympic and Paralympic Games.

“I get a real sense of being able to help and pass on knowledge that you’ve picked up for years,” said Roper, who was raised in South Wales but now lives in March, near Peterborough.

“When I was young, I never really had a professional athlete or somebody who had done it before to talk me through scenarios or this way of thinking.

“Ironically, I was kind of going in blind. It would have been great to have a person who's there for you to just listen and give you options, where your parents are going to say one thing and your teachers are going to say something else.

“The mentoring program is really good because we're there to be their ears and help guide them through situations that they may or may not have experienced before. It’s really good to be able to give back and I’ve been able to help far more than I thought I would.”

This year the Youth Sports Trust has collaborated with the True Athlete Project (TAP) to deliver a mentor programme for athletes with Olympians Sam Dickinson, Seonaid McIntosh and Rowan McKellar among those giving their time to support this year's cohort.

Roper says that the mentor programme has already been a mutually beneficial experience, and he cannot wait cheer Bodkin on later this month.

“The School Games National Finals is a great way to give all these potential GB athletes a feel for what it's like to be at major competitions," added Roper. 

“There's going to be an Olympic style village, so it helps place younger people into the major end of sports, but also it’s a friendly competition with not so much pressure.

“I couldn't have asked for a better mentee. Lewis really responds, he asks questions, he wants to learn more.

“I’m quite lucky that we’ve got a few similar hobbies. We both like Formula One, for example – I would say I hit the jackpot.”

A Games Fit for the Future.