Two Camborne students have shown their fiery side in business after being named winners of a Dragons Den style competition.

Cornwall College took inspiration from the popular TV programme to host its own version in honour of Global Entrepreneurship Week.

The organisers advertised the competition to all students across the seven Cornwall College campuses, searching for students who had ideas that had the potential to be a fully functioning business enterprise in the future.

The winners were decided by panellists James Strawbridge of The Hungry Sailors fame, design company owner Matt Hocking and Cornwall College tutors Sheila Burley and Jon Rolls.

The winning group Rapid Recovery, made up of Lia Foreman from Redruth and Hannah Smith from Hayle – both students at the college’s Camborne campus – impressed the panel with their enthusiastic delivery.

Sheila said: “This has been a fantastic event and all finalists presented their business ideas in a professional way and had obviously put a lot of effort into their planning.

“All ideas showed scope, and we will continue to work with the teams in order to help develop their ideas further.”

Those that were chosen to be in the final of the competition were in with a chance of winning the £1,000 prize money to help set up their business, thanks to a donation by Concorde Group.

The finalists were summoned to Market House in St Austell, which resembles the Dragons Den set. Students from the media department in St Austell filmed the process of the finalists pitching their ideas and stating why the “Dragons” should invest in them.

Rapid Recovery’s business plan was to promote a healthier lifestyle whilst undergoing exercise. They believe that after exercise there are plenty of healthy alternatives that benefit the active human being compared to the unhealthy stimulants such as energy drinks.

Rapid Recovery want to use their winning prize money to create samples of a nutritional selection box that will provide the right quantities of food after exercise.

Lia and Hannah Smith from Hayle said of their win: “It was a really good experience for us to pitch our idea; we are both really impressed with the comments that came back from the ‘Dragons’. We are both really excited to get this product onto the market.”