The History of Waveney Gym Club

The club was formed in 1976 at the Harris Middle School where it met every Saturday morning for many years, and the members were simply basic recreational gymnasts.

When Benjamin Britten High School was built in the early eighties, the club moved to the new school at the request of the head of Physical Education. This enabled the club to increase its number of sessions and therefore begin to raise the standards of gymnastic work. Over the years at this venue the club had a membership of around ninety gymnasts, which fluctuated between eighty and one hundred and ten. Success included several gymnasts who were members of the Suffolk County Squad and a few who managed to reach Regional Squad level. This was largely on the girls’ side, but the introduction of a boy’s section around 1990 saw standards rise here too. Within a short period of time boys were being selected for the Regional Squad and the club also had a couple of boys who went on to be National Squad gymnasts.

In 1994/95, the two main post holders at the club saw the opportunity to consider working towards the vision of a permanent built gymnastic facility in the town. John Pawsey, the secretary and chief coach at the time and Colin Price, the treasurer began to investigate and research the possibility of Lottery funding for such a project.

By 1998, after a great deal of hard work and negotiation with Suffolk Education Authority for part of the school field at Kirkley High to be allocated to such a building, a submission was made. Eventually approval for the project to go ahead was given in August 2001 and the building work started in February 2002. The club first used this fantastic facility in November 2002 and the official opening was held in January 2003.

COMPARING FACILITIES

From 1976 until 2002 the club had been putting all the equipment in and out every session and this eventually meant up to five times a week. Equipment wears out more quickly and is prone to damage in a situation such as this.

The new facility is equipped with GYMNOVA apparatus and not only is a much improved environment to work in, but of course enables the equipment to be out all the time. All sessions now benefit from full use of the time and training sessions have automatically become more rewarding for both coaches and gymnasts.

The complete fit out of equipment was around £150,000 but with membership rising and other uses being made of the centre, we will need a contingency fund to replace items when necessary.

Cle arly the new facility is a massive improvement on hiring school halls etc. that we had been experiencing for twenty-six years.

FUNDING

To purchase land to build such a wonderful building was never an option for a voluntary run organisation so we needed as much help as possible from a variety of sources. The club held several meetings with interested parents and coaches to keep them informed about how developments we taking shape. John had researched other centres across the country to select the best features of each to incorporate into the Waveney Gymnastic Centre. Suffolk Education Authority agreed to lease the land to the club on a 99-year term at a minimal rate.

An application to the Lottery for 90% funding, as Lowestoft is a priority area was sought and a grant of just over £1.2 million was awarded. The Waveney District Council community budget awarded £20,000. SRB funding was £75,000 and the club made other partnership funding with local companies to accumulate the remaining 11% of the full cost of the project at £1.4 million. Some members of the club took part in a sponsored parachute jump and a whole variety of other fund raising events helping to reach the full amount.

Fortun ately through excellent control of the building costs by the quantity surveyors, Cyril Sweett, the architects, Paul Robinson Partnership and the prudence of Colin Price the whole project was kept comfortably within the budget and original tendering figures.

MEMBERSHIP

In terms of the membership of the club, or at least those on our registers, we have gone up from around eighty-five in November 2002 to just under one thousand at this point in time.

Whereas we originally catered for young children between the ages of four and sixteen we have now branched out to a wider audience.

With in the sessions we offer there are Parent & Me sessions where parent come in with their preschool age youngsters to experience the facilities at the centre and qualified coaches oversee these sessions, FUN4BABY and FUN4TODDLER.

We have a variety of trampolining classes for youngsters through to adults, recreational Boy's and Girl's gymnastic classes six days of the week, improver and development classes, some special needs gymnastic classes and several Adult classes.

Initi ally our uptake was from the Lowestoft area, but now we find that our membership comes from a much wider area including Great Yarmouth, Norwich and several of the villages in North Suffolk along the Waveney Valley.

Gymnas tics is becoming more and more popular with all age groups and the club currently have two British Champions at adult veteran level. Consequently it is not just for young people, but is a good activity for all ages who wish to keep in good health.

TRAINING

This consists of a variety of approaches and the length of time spent on each aspect of a training session varies from one hour to three hours in total.

Generally all sessions begin with a warm-up, allotted time on apparatus including floor, asymmetric bars, vault and beam for girls or

floor, high bar, pommels, rings, vault and high bar for boys with a cooling and stretching down period at the end.

COACHES

The Centre Manager for the club is Vikki Rogers, who was appointed in November 2007, and our Assistant Manager, Peter Etherington is in overall charge of the gym area.

We have several coaches at the club, all are qualified in their specific area of gymnastics or trampolining, or are working towards gaining a qualification, as well as holding CRB's.

Our coaches have qualifications from Assistant Club Coach level through to Senior Club Coach in a range of disciplines. We have coaches with qualifications in pre-school gymnastics, general gymnastics, men’s artistic, women’s artistic, special needs gymnastics as well as trampolining and special needs trampolining.

Most coaches have been trained through a variety of courses available from British Gymnastics across the region and country, but we can always do with more help.

Some of our coaches also hold judging qualifications and John Pawsey sits on the Examination Board of B. G. as an external verifier of the system.

ASPIRATIONS

All coaches and members of the current Executive Committee of the club have similar views and aspirations for the future of the club. This predominantly is to establish a firm foundation and base from which the club can continue to develop and expand.

We believe that we should be able to increase participation and raise the standards of our gymnasts to produce both boys and girls to the highest possible level in the near future. Our intention is to bring national recognition to the club and area and encourage competitions to come and use the venue to promote the sport.

Several other groups within the community have already used the centre for events, this includes a martial arts course, fitness sessions, schools accessing the centre for trampolining classes and lots of great birthday party celebrations have been held here too!

MEDIA COVERAGE

Generally speaking the sport of gymnastics is given reasonable coverage in the local press, but it needs more support from other parts of the media.

Radio and TV coverage was given at the official opening, but the sport, which is clean of drugs, has a high commitment level from its participants and requires tremendous dedication and time, needs more exposure. Considering that the tickets for the gymnastic
events at major games like the Commonwealth and Olympic games are sell outs its is surprising that the media have not followed it more.

CONTACTS

For further information about Waveney Gymnastics Club contact the club on 01502-501419, or use this link to e-mail us at EMAIL, or visit the centre at:

101 Southwell Road, Lowestoft, Suffolk, NR33 0RR.

The club has Gym Mark status, which is a kite mark for the safety of youngsters and people in our care. We have a welfare committee and a fully committed Management Committee who are all volunteers.





“I think this is the best sport I have ever done and really look forward to a good work out each week…” “…It helps my balance for kite boarding.” Chris adult (22)

“I like everything about gymnastics, I sometimes don’t get on well with the bar” Laura (10)

“I like vault and floor best, I find bars the most difficult” Shelby (9)

“ Its nice to have a pit to practice in. I like bars and floor best. I find vault the most difficult” Stacey (10)

“ I like the tumble track because it’s really springy…” “…I find vault most difficult” Claire (11)