Sir – I was delighted to read earlier this year and again (Report, October 21) about Oxford University’s plans to redevelop the Iffley Road sports facilities, despite the fact that, as a current student at the university, I am unlikely ever to benefit from actually using the new facilities. It seems it is high time the university built a new gym.

When I first arrived here last year with stars in my eyes about the privilege and honour of attending a world-class university, with world-class facilities, I almost knelt down and wept when I saw the “weights room” at the Iffley gym.

The space is barely big enough to swing a cat, never mind a bar loaded with heavy weights. As a powerlifter and Olympic-style weightlifter who has lifted nationally and internationally, and who has seen her fair share of grim gyms, I had expected that Oxford’s reputation for cutting-edge research would somehow include cutting-edge sports facilities. How wrong I was! I now train, to great expense to myself, at a commercial gym.

The basis for just about every sport that is not a marathon is explosive speed and power, and the primary and most successful means of achieving that is Olympic-style weightlifting, the fastest, most powerful sport in the Olympics.

You want to run faster, jump higher, throw further, row quicker, lift heavier? Do Olympic-style weightlifting. I would like to make a sincere appeal to the planners of this new facility not to just include a 3m by 3m “weights room” as an afterthought, but to make the central aspect of the facility a weightlifting hall, with platforms, bars, racks, rubber weights and most importantly, an excellent coach.

From this central basis in strength and explosive power training will flow excellence in other sports, be they rugby, rowing, athletics, basketball, or even table tennis.

Roslin Adamson, Oxford