Extra curriculars for vet med

How do you guys balance extra curriculars with study/work experience and what extra curriculars do you do?

I know some of the unis (Cambridge) don't really care about extra curriculars but some do- Bristol say the personal statement is 70% of the application, and extra curriculars are 20% of the personal statement... I'd like to apply to Bristol so I feel like I should up my EC game.

Unfortunately I have no clue what extra curriculars to do. I used to do so much (rowing, CCF, debate, violin, orchestra, choir) but obviously I had to focus on work a bit more when I hit GCSEs so that's been cut down to just violin (kind of by accident). I sort of hate sports except running (alone) which I do on my own timings and wouldn't really be interested in joining a club/team because I need to be able to control how much I run based on how motivated I am and how healthy I am... I'd like to join some music based things but I'm not very good on the violin (grade 4).

Would volunteering count? At a charity shop nearby or even at some stables (I'm wondering if the stables would be too close to being in the work experience section).

It's annoying because my main passion is animals (followed by languages, and there's no languages classes for under 18s near me) but I can't use animal related things for ECs because I need to be 'well rounded'.

Sorry for the ramble- do any of you have any suggestions?

Just so you know, Bristol will not be looking at personal statements for Veterinary Science this year. They're looking at the questionnaire which they send out.
This is from their admissions statement: "We will not be using the Personal Statement in assessing applications in 2018."

Really? I can't remember where I found it on the website but I was reading something that said they used work experience. It was probably way out of date though... Thanks!

That's very comforting, as AFAIK (apparently I'm very often wrong so no one quote me on this) Edinburgh, Cambridge and Bristol (my top three) won't care about ECs. Good news all round- time to get back to finding WE then!

Just because they do not use personal statements doesn't mean the don't care about ECs at interviews etc!
It shouldn't need to be a chore, just find something you enjoy. Life shouldn't just be about studying

The problem here comes when my interests are very much centred around animals (why I want to be a vet in the first place!). I enjoy my work experience, I enjoy further reading, I enjoy learning anatomy (at least now, when it isn't for an exam). *I don't enjoy studying for school* The issue is that most of the things I think of when you say 'things you enjoy' are to do with animals or science (volunteering at stables/animal shelters, reading about genetics/anatomy), and these things aren't seen as extra curricular because they're useful to the application in other ways.

The only extra curriculars I really do are violin and running, will these be enough? I'm only grade 4 in violin, and I run alone not as part of a club- I sometimes do Saturday parkruns.

Running is a hobby - I walk my dogs as mine! Violin is an extra curricular as well, I put down that I played the flute and piano.

I was never the student who did DofE etc, I literally put on my PS and spoke about in interviews the fact I spend a lot of time out with my dogs, I played the flute and violin, I bake and I like to read - was good enough for them!

Running is a good one to use if you're ever asked about how you would deal with stress in the workplace!