British Paralympic champion and former QE pupil Tom Aggar (1995-2002) continues to dominate his sport. He was named 2010 World Rowing Adaptive Crew of the Year by the sport’s international governing body – for the second year in a row.

The award winners were announced at World Rowing’s annual gala dinner at the River and Rowing Museum in Henley.

The accolade follows a season during which he remained unbeaten in the adaptive men’s single scull and improved his own World Best time. In November 2010, he trounced the opposition at the World Rowing Championships, winning gold by a 13-second margin to secure his third Championships title.

Tom won gold at the 2008 Beijing Paralympics and has already been named in the GB Rowing Team for the London Paralympics in 2012. He started rowing as part of rehabilitation programme, following an accident in 2005 that left him paralysed. He trains under coach Tom Dyson and is currently a Sports Sciences MSc student at Brunel University.

Eigo Takeda is a high-flier, even by the standards of QE: he gained straight A*s in his A-levels, won a place to read Mathematics at Cambridge and played in two national youth orchestras. Yet he spoke no English at all when he arrived in England at the age of nine and was still struggling with the language when he came to QE two years later.

His mother took the bold decision to put him forward for a place at QE. Eigo was already showing promise as a violinist, so in addition to the general entrance tests, he sat Music auditions for QE. “In Year 7, I was quite overwhelmed by the other boys: they were really competitive and intelligent, and I was in the bottom set,” Eigo says.

Slowly but surely, however, he began to advance, thanks to hard work and a positive attitude. By the time Eigo took his GCSEs, the linguistic challenges were largely overcome, as evidenced by his 11 A* grades and 2 As, including A*s in English and English Literature.

His music also advanced. He gained his Grade 8 at violin in Year 9 and his Diploma two years later, eventually winning places with both the English Schools Orchestra and National Children’s Chamber Orchestra. He also played for the school’s Symphony Orchestra, String Quartet and Camerata (strings orchestra).

Reflecting on his seven years at QE, Eigo said: “It’s an excellent school with a great environment, where everyone is so competitive and intelligent. You are pushed to work hard because you don’t want to be left behind: it’s not forced on you; you are forcing yourself.”

A Queen Elizabeth’s School team won the U14 tournament at the National Schools’ Chess Team Championships – and two boys received prizes for their individual performances too.

The QE U14 A team amassed an impressive score of 24 points out of a possible 30 at the event in Somerset, narrowly beating another school with a strong chess tradition, Magdalen College School, Oxford.

Year 9 boys Ben Collins and Madhi Elango both won prizes for the leading performance on their board. The other members of the victorious team were: Joseph Levene (Year 8), Jake Breindel (Year 7) and Ram Popat (Year 9).

Teacher Geoff Roberts, who leads chess at the School, said: “After several near misses in recent years, to capture a national chess title is very pleasing.”

Old Elizabethan Lucian Grainge has become Chief Executive Officer of the world’s largest recording company, Universal Music Group.

Long acknowledged as one of the most influential people in the global music industry, on the same day as he received his CBE at Buckingham Palace he was feted at the Brit music awards when news of his forthcoming appointment as CEO broke.

He has worked with a roster of artists such as Amy Winehouse, U2, Duffy, Girls Aloud and Eminem and is known both for fostering digital partnerships and for taking a tough stance on illegal file-sharing.

Now in his early fifties, his own eye for retail is said to go back to his childhood, when he would study which records customers chose in his father's TV, radio and record shop.