Swimming in Shepway
Tim Wiseman
and
Kevin O’Connor
Agenda
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Introductions
Background
What could we improve upon?
Challenges
Does anyone else…?
SDC and Roger De Haan Charitable Trust
What next?
Who is it for?
What competitions?
Additional Information
Questions and Answers
Close
Introductions
 Tim Wiseman – Head Coach Hythe Aqua
 Kevin O’Connor – Head Coach Folkestone Sports Centre
Swimming Club
 Dan Hulme – The Roger De Haan Charitable Trust
 Wilbert Greaves – Shepway District Council Sports
Development Officer
 Stuart Jones – Chairman Folkestone Sports Centre
Swimming Club
 Jim Parris – Chairman Hythe Aqua
Background
 For the past 40 years Shepway has had two strong swimming clubs
 Both clubs take swimmers from teaching to swim through to masters
 We support currently, or have previously, multiple disciplines including
 Competitive swimming
 Synchronised swimming
 Water Polo
 Life Saving
 Masters
 Open water swimming
 Even diving!
 Shepway is a relatively small area to draw swimmers from and half of
our catchment area is the English Channel!
 However each club, and their respective swimmers, have been
successful often to very high standards both in the past and currently
What could we improve upon?
 Is what we are constantly looking at and have been since
we started coaching
 We have always tried to set objectives for our clubs, both in
training and competition, that are stretching and challenging
enough to show constant improvement
 This has to be a steady improvement so as not to put off
those swimmers who don’t have the desire to aim higher but
still want to swim competitively for their club
 We have strived, as clubs, to meet these objectives and have
been successful in hitting them
 However taking the clubs to a more successful level
generates its own challenges
Challenges
 Some of our challenges are
 Lack of pool time available and at a reasonable cost
 Lack of dry land training including stretching
 Not enough strength in depth of squads to be as competitive as
possible at the higher levels
 Not being able to properly support our swimmers as they qualify
for more prestigious competitions
 A relatively small pool of qualified volunteer teachers and
coaches and the ability to train them to better support our
swimmers
 Access to funding
 Losing swimmers to other “bigger” clubs
Does anyone else have same
challenges?
 This is when Jim and I started to have discussions
 It became clear that we both have similar issues and both
had ideas on how we could overcome them
 We continued to meet further with both Stuart and Tim
joining our regular discussions to develop our ideas
 It was agreed that working more closely together to
support each other could greatly assist both clubs
 At this point we decided to discuss further with Shepway
District Council and the Roger De Haan Charitable trust as
we knew that there were already plans in place for the
development of sports in Shepway
Shepway District Council and
The Roger De Haan Charitable Trust
Dan and Wilbert will now explain more about
Sports Development in the Shepway area
What Next?
 Following our discussions and having heard from both
Dan and Wilbert we thought the way forward was to
form a new club called Shepway Swimming Club
 The purpose of the new club being to
 Provide additional pool and land training time
 Give our swimmers as much support as possible locally
 Enter certain events jointly thereby improving the
strength in depth of the team
 Enter higher standard competitions jointly
 Secure additional funding
 Utilise the support of the Roger De Haan Charitable
Trust and Shepway District Council
Who is it for?
 The club would be open to all but is centred around
the members of both Folkestone and Hythe
 It is not just for Elite swimmers as we will enter
competitions with two teams the second being the
development squad
What competitions will be entered?
 Kent Junior League
 National Arena Swimming League
 Also the ability to enter competitions like
 East Invicta Championships
 Kent Championships
Additional Information (1 of 2)
 The clubs are not merging
 Both will retain their own identity and enter competitions in
their own right. For example the development series of galas
 A constitution for the new club has been agreed by the ASA
and a committee will be formed with members from both
clubs
 Is it a take over?
 No definitely not hence keeping two separate clubs
 Movements between clubs will be discouraged and will
only be sanctioned by the agreement of both clubs
 Neither club wants to poach swimmers from each other
 Will this new club involve the other disciplines?
 Yes if they want to
Additional information (2 of 2)
 How much will it cost?
 Very little the Clubs ASA registration has been paid for as has
that of the swimmers through their own clubs
 We don’t plan on lots of additional kit but will have our own
identity with items like hats
 How will swimmers be selected for the teams?
 On their ability the same as now and jointly by the two clubs
 It is anticipated that we will jointly hold a Shepway
Championships gala
Questions and Answers
 Please feel free to ask any questions and we will do
our best to answer you
Close
Thank you for coming
Kevin and Tim