Bedford swimming club receives vital funding from the Swimathon Foundation

A swimming club in Bedford has benefited from Swimathon's Covid-19 Relief Fund.

Modernian Swimming Club, in Clarendon Street, applied for the grant as part of Swimathon Foundation’s Covid-19 Relief Fund, to mitigate loss of income whilst pools are closed.

The club was formed in 1965 and is a not-for-profit competitive community-based club for swimmers aged over eight.

The club develops swimmers through the competitive rankings and has members competing at County, Regional and National level.

As well as supporting their competitive squads, the club also provide swimming lessons for the community, with 290 local swimmers on the programme.

The club work closely within the community and offer a number of hardship grants for those with financially challenging situations to learn to swim at no cost.

Without additional funding, the club were having to consider using these hardship grants to keep the club afloat.

Paula Barker, from Modernian Swimming Club, said: “The funding is huge for us really, we are quite a small club as clubs go.

"We have about 100 competitive swimmers and provide lessons for about 300 children a week as well.

"All of our income has gone since the end of march and like a lot of clubs we don’t have our own pool so we really need that income from the lessons to subsidise the competitive side of the squad.

“Of course we still have some of the fixed costs going out, costs like carrying on with insurance, DBS checks for some of the teachers even though they aren’t in the pool, some of the online training courses.

"As well as paying our coach because he doesn’t qualify for any of the government schemes at the moment as he came back to the country from Canada in November so he didn’t qualify as an employee or self-employed because he hasn’t got the tax returns from the previous years.

“It means we can keep things ticking over until we are allowed back in the water which for us we don’t know will be before September because three of the pools we use are all school pools.”

Swimathon Foundation recently announced £50,000 worth of grants had been awarded to over one hundred swimming clubs, swimming schools and independent aquatic organisations.

The Foundation was overwhelmed by the number of applications received and took the decision to boost its original commitment of £30,000 to £50,000 to cover the grants for small swimming and aquatic organisations who have suffered short-term financial hardship due to the coronavirus pandemic.

Anthony Kendall OBE, Chair of the Swimathon Foundation said: “In these difficult times for all swimming organisations, the Swimathon Foundation has been determined to play its part in supporting those smaller, local groups that are the foundation of swimming participation throughout the UK.

"We have been taken aback by the number of people who need help during these unprecedented times and that is why we have increased our overall donation to £50,000.

"Swimming is a vital community activity and we are proud to play our part.”

The Swimathon Foundation is a remarkable ‘force for good’ in communities all across the UK, its main pool-based ‘Swimathon’ has raised over £50 million for charities since it was started some 33 years ago.

‘Swimathon’ is the UK’s biggest pool-based recreational swimming event, it takes place annually at some 600 pools across the UK and some 750,000 people have taken part since the first event in 1986. As a result of coronavirus, this year’s event is now scheduled to take place later in the year.

The Government has outlined the measures that will allow outdoor pools to reopen from July 11, and indoor gyms, swimming pools and sports facilities to reopen from July 25, ensuring millions of people can get back into more sport and fitness activities

For more information about The Swimathon Foundation, visit www.swimathonfoundation.org.