Monday Motivation - Ashley Down Old Boys Rugby Club and WESPORT

Monday Motivation - #ActiveLockleaze Project - Spotlight On

As part of our partnership project #ActiveLockleaze we like to feature regular posts for our Monday Motivation or Spotlight On section.

This is just one of the ways we promote physical activities and sports opportunities in Lockleaze. By sharing providers and participants’ personal stories we aim to inspire and motivate and encourage all residents to lead more active lives.

This week we focus on Ashley Down Old Boys Rugby Club and WESPORT “Back in the game” Funding.

Last year we were encouraged by Maria at Lockleaze Neighbourhood Trust to apply for Wesport’s “Back in the game” funding. Like all local community grass roots sports club the pandemic has had a detrimental effect on morale and finances. We are a club in the heart of Lockleaze and we have been growing our junior section and connection within the area over the last 5 or 6 years so much so that we have around 225 children enjoying rugby with us—the large majority of whom are local.

We have a number of children and siblings whose families unfortunately are not in good financial shape and we do what we can to provide free rugby to those that need it most.

Over the years as numbers grow and keep growing we find the economics of our success ever more challenging so the chance of some help was very attractive indeed.

Aside from our main aim of providing rugby and a family environment to as many youngsters as we can we find we need more coaches, more first aiders , safeguarding, PITCH SPACE and like all rugby at the moment more referees. The humbling thing is that we are getting parents and guardians coming forward to take a number of essential roles on and even some of our teenagers are getting in to coaching and official reffing!

Locally we are trying to create partnerships with local primary and secondary schools and academies and we have recently run a very successful initial training night for boys and girls from Trinity Academy and here is a comment from their head of sport from their newsletter. On Tuesday 16th May, we were lucky enough to take 25 learners from Yr7-9 to Ashley Down RUFC for a taster session. The learners absolutely loved their session, and had a great first experience at contact rugby.

We look forward to building our partnership with Ashley Down, promoting lifelong physical activity in sport and continuing their development in rugby. A big thanks to both the coaches and current team members at Ashley Down for planning and running a fantastic session.

We received our very generous funding in May and it has been used and will carry on being used to support our mission of providing a safe and friendly environment for youngsters in the local area and wider to come and enjoy rugby and just as importantly make friends for life. Specifically we have used the money for first aid , coach training, safeguarding courses, refs courses and providing pitch space and time over the summer and beyond.

We really appreciate your help and I will leave the last word to Charlotte Williams our recently appointed Chair of the Minis & Junior Section:

“With the money provided we have been able to provide club membership to several children that would not be able to afford so otherwise. We have been able to pay for the pitch over summer, so that the young people do not have to go several months without rugby. We have also been able to provide essential first aid courses and safeguarding courses for our volunteer coaches, and we are booking many many more to cover all of the areas Gary has mentioned. We really appreciate your help and we will not forget it! ”

Find out more and explore here; padlet.com/activelockleaze/activelockleaze