Between blotch and blok

yes - fencing is cool. I have so loved taking it up!
I hated sports a comprehensive. I couldn;t abide being made to run around a sports field three times in pain (I didn't realise other people did not have a permanentn pain in their right ankle until many years later). I liked Netball, but in a vast comprehensive you didn't get to play in a team therefore you didn't get coaching and so none took it seriously. There we also had comunal showers.
The girls grammar was heaps better. no showers at all. no cross country or athletics. We had skirts for PE (and I prefer skirts to trousers for all activities for precisely the reasons that you outlined re shorts and pads). I loved dance,trampoline and gym, pre menstruation, and got to do badminton afterwards - I don;t know how they managed it , but I think the school had a well run and sympathetic PE department that were passionate that all girls enjoy some exercise. With the emphasise on enjoy. Within their limits they did what they could to cope with our likes and dislikes. The comprehensive onthe other hand believed in forcing everyone to do the same things - enjoyment wasn;t what it was about, rather that we were exercised inthe way they thought fit.