“It was an experience none of us could have imaged in the 60 years the club has been running”. The story of how a local black country sports club ran during and recovered from the Covid-19 pandemic

Image Credit: Halesowen News

Halesowen Swimming Club’s chairperson has spoken off the difficulties the club has faced during and following one of the deadliest diseases ever recorded, as well as how the site and club has recovered since the last lockdown of March 2021.

The Covid-19 pandemic was a horrible ordeal for many sports and social clubs, who in March 2020 were forced to shut their doors, some of which were unable to re-open for several months as well as some who had to close for the forceable future.

The aftereffects of the virus had huge implications for many sports and social clubs, whether it was football, tennis, cricket, rugby or any other club that involved a sociable aspect.

Halesowen Swimming Club was formed in 1963 and has been praised on numerous occasions on how inclusive and family-orientated they are, as well as their ability to other swimming courses to several different age groups and showcase people on the biggest of stages, in competitions like the national qualifiers.

The club chairperson Andrea Stephens has shared her perspective and giving an insight from the very top of a clubs’ authority ranks the chairperson of the club, who are part of Halesowen Leisure Centre to get a full insight into the issues a local black country club faced as well as the ways in which they tried to re-build and reach a level of sustainability.

“It was unprecedented when the lockdown was announced, an experience nobody would have imagined in the 60 years that the club has been running. We knew after the announcement of school closures etc, that swimming clubs like ours would close.

"There was a slight delay due to the government checking for the spread of Covid in the water, so we weren’t shut down as early as other places but when it properly affected us.

“We had to make adaptions, we had to separate cubicles, social distance people in changing rooms and use single file lines when walking around the centre. When we were forced to close, we turned our attention to land training and in isolation offered online training programs that helped members stay with us, as well as engage with them and entertain them too which massively helped bring us together through such a difficult period.  

“We had to focus from a human and social perspective, from a human point we had to check on families and members, especially our senior swimmers who are vulnerable both mentally and physically, they trained a lot and swum every day, so we set up special clinics to speak with them and check up on them.

“We built continuity and wanted people to still feel like they belonged at the club and were part of the team, we have a huge team of volunteers that helped bring everyone together, we had quiz nights with prizes, everyone in their lounges taking part in that.

"The centre helped us a lot, we reduced our fees to whatever was necessary, so just normal membership and we were lucky cause when we re-opened unlike a lot of clubs who folded, we were able to bring all our members back to the club.

“Before it started all the simmers would come and arrive to poolside, go to the changing rooms and get in the pool and that stayed during the pandemic. We did change some of the safeguarding regimes and as a club we really valued the work that volunteers did during that lockdown period.

"I think it has made us more family centred, so we have thought more about the social aspect of the club and how it important that is as well as the competitive training side, that has been a big realisation as to how much we needed each other during and since the dark moments of Covid.”

The centre underwent a huge change after the Covid-19 pandemic, when the plans were accepted of the redevelopment of the swimming club and the site as a whole. The 8.7-million-pound development included an extension to the gym, a new wellness suite, a relocation of a brand new reception area, a new adventure play facility, new café and façade treatment and landscaping to the surrounding area.

Image Credit: Dudley Council News & Speller Metcalfe

All of this has contributed to a 92% growth in memberships and prompted Councillor Simon Phipps to say “I am delighted we have been able to produce such an outstanding leisure facility – the first in the borough for a generation. The facilities it boasts are second to none and I am sure new and existing visitors to our leisure centres will be overwhelmed with what we have to offer.”

“Since the centre got revamped, a lot of organisers of events have asked if we can host events here,” said Andrea Stephens. “We have a huge spectator area that can host 300 people or so, which is a huge draw for competitions and other events, overall, the leisure centre’s development has massively helped the club, its popularity and the new facilities have given us a new lease of life. “

“Our membership and volunteer membership has grown significantly since the end of Covid lockdowns, pre Covid we were under 300 members and targeted around that mark but since the pandemic we are reaching numbers of 425 and more.

"We have a lot more depth of performance and age groups, competitively we now have a lot more county regional and national swimmers that are coming here which has massively boosted popularity.

"We have had a lot of success in competitions, regionally and on a national stage, we have recently just qualified for the arena league championships and currently, historically we have always been in the second division and now we have the opportunity to reach the Premiership which is a massive boost to the club and their coaches, all of this has come on leaps and bounds since we got back to normal after Covid.

Public health Scotland investigated during Covid as to the impacts that the pandemic had on social interactions and the impacts of the disconnected across social communities. They reported off the ‘isolation and disconnection people felt from the outside world and that those feelings of isolation and loneliness were not resolved using online platforms’.

They also reported off the ‘impacts on mental health of the people them spoke to them, not being able to socialise face to face and struggles of knowing they weren’t able to speak closely to family and friends.’

I spoke to Andrea on this issue, and she stated, “We recognized the challenges that people faced with lockdown particularly with the younger people, a lot of learning was online, so they weren’t able to improve and develop their social interaction skills.

"We had to build on that social aspect, and we had to reiterate to people that they were still part off the community even though they were stuck at home, our club is dependent on volunteers and the people that use our facilities so reconnecting them and allowing them to give back to us was huge.”