‘Nothing has changed’: Details of old Loughborough hockey initiations surface

An ex-Loughborough Women's Hockey player has shared details and photos from her Hockey initiation in 2016, telling The Tab that "nothing has changed" since her experience.

Amy*, an ex-Hockey club member who was a fresher in 2016, had to endure almost the exact same initiation experience as that which Women's Hockey freshers were put through two weeks ago.

This included being forced to eat maggots, having Vaseline brushed into their hair and being tricked into almost eating a live centipede. Freshers were also pelted with eggs and made to down drinks throughout the night.

Amy told The Tab: "Our initiations were exactly the same three years ago and I can imagine the years before and after have been similar.

"I only just turned 18 before I came to uni so couldn’t go out much until I came, so I wasn’t used to drinking at all. We had to dress as golf balls and walk round town from house to house doing very similar challenges as described in the original post."

Amy was made to eat dog food, raw onions and down pints. She was pelted with drinks and eggs. She said: "I had Vaseline, flour and eggs and drink in my hair which took nearly a week to get out. I took the shots over my eyebrows being shaved. But yeah we had to down wine and beer and eat food and then we were made to run places, and lie on the street in cold temperatures."

This tradition is still present to this year, as a fresher at the initiation two weeks ago was taken home when she became so cold at one point that her teeth were chattering and she was given a foil hypothermia blanket.

Amy added: "One [challenge] included sitting in a basement doing some sort of roulette which had fish paste, chilli paste and garlic paste as well as drinks and downing these things. We were made to do the cinnamon challenge and weren’t allowed a drink during/after, hence I threw up all over myself which you can see on my t shirt."

Amy after her initiation

Amy ended up drunk, walking around the city centre on her own in the cold until a flatmate came to collect her. She told The Tab: "The whole thing made me so overwhelmed that I cried because I then got lost in the dark in town and was so drunk that I didn’t know how to get home, which was like a 20 minute walk. Thankfully my flat mates picked up their phones and came to get me in town but yeah it was not a good experience."

Amy says the initiations go hand in hand with social pressure and negative attitudes that are perpetuated by the club. She says: "The club itself is very divided, the performance squad (1s/2s) is very good, they’re generally very nice people, work hard and represent the club well. Yet, it’s further down the teams in the 3/4/5s where there’s social pressure, especially when you’re a fresher to the club.

"If you don’t fit in with the ‘popular’ girls who are attractive, like boys and revolve all their social life around drinking, you’re pretty much excluded from the club and people make harsh judgements about you and talk about you negatively without any good reason.

"The entire culture of the club is just strange because there’s no need for it to be like that. You meet people at the freshers trials and everyone is really excited and keen and friendly, then most get drawn into trying to be a popular girl who fits in with the older popular girls every year and they try and meet the standards and expectations of them.

"Then those same popular girls who say harsh things about others get voted on to committee, who run the events and socials and the cycle simply continues. It’s a shame because I’ve met some lovely girls but the experience was certainly overshadowed by the negatives which is why I left the club. I was also called a cunt when I left so no regrets leaving haha."

A Loughborough University spokesperson said: "The University investigates all incidents it is made aware of. The allegations from 2016 were not reported to the University."

Loughborough SU and Loughborough Women's Hockey have been contacted for comment.

*Names have been changed to protect anonymity.