The Olympic Legacy?

[John Sturgess]

Some sports – Cycling, Athletics, Hockey anyway – were clear about what an Olympic Legacy would look like for them – in all those cases, more club members, and more club members competing, in their sports.

It is hard to get a similarly clear one-sentence picture of what the Olympic Legacy in Canoe Slalom is meant to look like: maybe to increase our chances of winning medals in 2016 so that we get more money 2016 – 20 so that we can win more medals in 2020? All a bit circular? And unsustainable: it stops when the money stops.

The sport is currently spending north of £200,000 pa on a Legacy programme at Lee Valley, whose major component seems to be screening 1400 children in local schools - each year (presumably) - then telling most of them that there is no place for them in Canoe Slalom – including even the 37? 60? who really want to paddle slalom. Contrast this with ‘The Lee Valley Legacy Programme adds up to a very simple formula whose outcome is getting more young people paddling and providing the opportunity for them to progress. Hopefully one of these young paddlers will step onto the podium at a future Olympic Games.’ It is even hard to square it with ‘creating a lasting legacy for canoeing to help GB Canoeing achieve its vision of being the number 1 Olympic canoeing nation, with success and depth of excellence at every level’. Clubs talk about how hard it is to find children: and here is a costly programme finding them, then throwing most of them away. Mrs Beeton and Beef Stock?

The programme says ‘It is hoped that the remainder will still join a local canoe club and become involved in the sport that way.’ The problem is that there is no sufficiently active Slalom Club anywhere near – and nobody seems to have realised that without a related Club the Legacy Programme is fatally flawed. Abroad people do not usually build facilities like this without planning for Club use. Look at Cergy, Bourg St Maurice, Bratislava, Liptovsky Mikulas, Wietrvnice, Krakow, Augsburg. In some cases the new Clubhouse was handed over to an existing Club; in some cases a new Club was created. But at Holme Pierrepont the Club was an afterthought (although eventually a highly successful one); and there is no provision at Lee Valley (or at Markkleeberg or Dutch Water Dreams).

Why is a Club needed?
• To accommodate those who have been enthused to get tried out, and then told that they will not get places on the TID Squad.
• To accommodate those who are told a few months or a year down the line that they have not reached the required standard, but still want to carry on paddling.
• To accommodate those who reach the end of their ‘contract’ and do not qualify for the next level of Squad, whatever it is called by then.
• To provide direct comparisons so that paddlers can see more accurately how they are progressing compared with the ‘general’ slalom paddling population, thus avoiding the dangers of complacency built into an isolated model like Lee Valley.
• Most importantly: to provide the sense of social integration that plays such a major role in keeping children in sport: the difference between a Football Team in isolation, and a Football Team which is part of a large Football Club.

All of this works at Holme Pierrepont, and is clearly beneficial both to the TI&D Squad there and the Club as a whole; as it is, for instance, at Breadalbane. Adults are sometimes not aware that groups of children can simultaneously compete and co-operate! And it is Clubs like that which are building the numbers in the sport, without enormous and disproportionate expenditure.




So how is it done?
• 50-60 children coming for selection, of whom 15 will be chosen (though report suggests that more than that 50-60 might be willing/able: if so, get them along also)
• Put the children and their parents in a room (lock them in?). Explain that all of this is only going to work if there is a Canoe Club – there is no existing Canoe Club – so one has to be created – that means the people in the room have to be the Club.
• Explain what help the BCU, Pathway, etc will provide – but that all the help has to go through the new Club.
• Hand out membership forms and explanatory notes, and a draft constitution. The next time they come in they will have to adopt a constitution, and elect an interim committee.
• The next time they come in do exactly that (although you will only need the parents in the room this time). Then you start discussing practicalities with the new committee … boats, coaching, access to LVWWC, use of premises at LVWWC, etc
• And the Club is up and running …

Who should do it?
One of the problems will be, I am sure, that it is not in anyone’s job description; and World Class/GB Canoeing has always majored in telling employees what they are NOT allowed to do/who they are NOT allowed to coach, in a way that other sports do not.

So somebody out of the half dozen full time employees in the area will need to be told to do it. But which one? And by whom? Is it important enough for Paul Owen to be involved?

I am sure that 6/7 hours per week (reducing) spent on this would produce more impact than anything else any of them are spending 6/7 hours per week on.

How difficult is the above?
I can hear everyone saying ‘this is just John being controversial: it couldn’t be done’.

Well, I have done it, regularly, and never failed. Google ‘Gedling Gymnastics Club’: that is one of mine, to quote Slarti Bartfast. Or ‘Gedling Athletic Development Academy’. Want any more? Or you could talk to Steve MacDonald or Richard Lee.

The impact?

Over the next few years the need for help would diminish; and the Olympic Legacy would be a Canoe Club with 60-80 junior slalomists eventually, almost all competing at 9+ races a year, and hosting/incorporating a vibrant TI&D setup.

That would in itself establish the South of England in its proper place in slalom; that additional activity would also fuel the demand/need for races around London, which would in turn impact on the local clubs that have recently been in decline in numbers/regularity of racing: Shepperton, Tandridge, maybe Winchester.

And we might even get races on the Legacy Loop.

[BaldockBabe]

Since no-onehas responded I figure I will.

I absolutely agree with you John. I think that something like this needs to be done at Lee Valley before it is too late.

I think you would find that there are people in the area willing to help but the main barrier to success is coaches. Without coaches the club would very rapidly fold. If someone could supply the coaches (at least for a few years until the club is fully functioning) then I am sure everything else would fall into place.

[Dee]

I agree and we will never get coaches whilst it involves so many hoops and paperwork!

[Canadian Paddler]

Thanks Munchkin, breaking the deafening silence. I too agree with John, but do not know how to affect it as I do not have time to get in a boat, let alone drive 2 hours each way to assist in the setting up of the club.

I believe John is suggesting

So somebody out of the half dozen full time employees in the area will need to be told to do it. But which one? And by whom? Is it important enough for Paul Owen to be involved?

I am sure that 6/7 hours per week (reducing) spent on this would produce more impact than anything else any of them are spending 6/7 hours per week on.

i.e. those initially helping the Legacy project. But how do we do that? er, um . . . . That is where t all breaks down. IMHO clubs are successful when someone steps up and takes it on. If they are successful enough then more people step up and the club is self perpetuating, otherwise it shrivels when that person has had enough. (Oh NO, it sounds like I am agreeing with John that we need more big clubs..... Drat it, well he can't be wrong all the time )

[Dee]

IMHO clubs are successful when someone steps up and takes it on. If they are successful enough then more people step up and the club is self perpetuating, otherwise it shrivels when that person has had enough.

This really is the thing. A lot of the success of some of the northern clubs and regions has been down to a very small number of individuals who have had the time, energy and willingness to put in gargantuan amounts of effort to make things work. Yes, they have got other people on board and enthused but a lynch pin is still needed. And unless a lynch pin is available for Lee Valley then there will be no club.

I do think that, to some extent, there is an issue here with the regional divide. On average, people work longer hours and travel for longer to get to work in the SE (and to a slightly lesser extent East Anglia and the South) than those in the North. This sadly means less free time. Add to that, a migration of people away from the South East in early retirement and a higher cost of living (meaning that most couples both work) and it is much harder to get anyone to commit to anything because no-one has any spare time.

[bankside]

In Scotland some coaches are employed by the SCA to help develop the clubs. At least that's the story this year.
And I understand that's part of the approach in Wales = paid coaches.
Perhaps this approach could be followed by Canoe England or GB Canoeing.

[djberriman]

I beleive we have some paid coaches in England now, although they seem more targetted at progressing current paddlers who show talent but it's very early days and I'm expecting it also to benefit clubs in the area and it is indeed the intention to work with the coaches too so in a round about way it should help club development.

I think one thing that missed in the Olympic legacy is that there should have been a requirement to provide access for say 2 weekends a year to slalom for free to run events. Thus the business model would have been develped around doing that rather than us (as it appears to me at least) being an afterthought to commerical interests (rafting). The same should perhaps have been provided for at Tees and HPP when they got substantial investment to ensure that slalom could access the facilities.

[747boy]

LVRPA will be setting up a club this winter (infrastructure currently being built)
Look at the provisional 2014 calendar and you will see a double div 2/3 and a div 2 night slalom all at LV being run by GB Canoeing.
Also for information 2 events at Dobbs Weir are being introduced after many many years off the calendar again being run by GB canoeing.
Lets give GB canoeing a little bit of time before we really bash them #theyaretrying

[Neil H]

LVRPA will be setting up a club this winter (infrastructure currently being built)
Look at the provisional 2014 calendar and you will see a double div 2/3 and a div 2 night slalom all at LV being run by GB Canoeing.
Also for information 2 events at Dobbs Weir are being introduced after many many years off the calendar again being run by GB canoeing.
Lets give GB canoeing a little bit of time before we really bash them #theyaretrying

I think this is somehow missing the point. John, Michelle et al are all committed to this sport and yet presumably nine of them knew this was happening, hence the original post. Maybe better communication would alleviate this. I think the point is how many of the young people who didn't get a place will be picked up. It must be unique to have an instant membership of almost 1400 but if they are not picked up by this club, is it possible that they can be picked up by other clubs in the region. It would be interesting to see how many of them do and in the longer term how they progress through the club system.
I would think that left to there own devices they may not contact clubs. so is there a way that clubs can follow them up?

[John Sturgess]

I may have slightly crossed wires with 747boy

LVPRA may be building a clubhouse - but I do not see how they would have the skillsets, or the contacts, to create a club - and there is no indication on their website that I can find of their having Sports Development capacity. Clubhouses are fine - but most of the strong slalom clubs in Britain do not have them - so not essential. However people are - paddlers, their families, other volunteers etc

Nor was I 'accusing' GBCanoeing - they would undoubtedly say that creating a Club is not in their work programmes

But someone in the BCU operation with the seniority and authority - John Anderson? Paul Owen? - needs to see the implications: without a club at Lee Valley there will not be a sustainable Legacy. Yes there are other Canoe Clubs in the area - but only Viking and Shepperton are significantly slalom clubs (and on current figures I would doubt if either could handle 40+ new young paddlers a year...)

[747boy]

Again lets wait a little while to see what happens at LVWWC.
Don't bash or even make comment on something not in your region when you have absolutely no idea what is going on behind the scenes.
GB canoeing and the LVRPA are working their socks off to get this set up.

Yours in Slalom,

One very pxxxxed off LV parent.

[BaldockBabe]

Again lets wait a little while to see what happens at LVWWC.
Don't bash or even make comment on something not in your region when you have absolutely no idea what is going on behind the scenes

I am very active in the slalom world and help at events from div 4 to Prem around the UK.I also compete in events from div 1 to div 4. Lastly I am the regional slalom Rep for the Eastern Region.This IS my region and I have no idea what is going on!!!

No, it's nothing to do with me not caring, I have been down to the Sat training to offer to help and was ignored.

People here are not having a go at anyone but many are very experienced in the sport in many ways and with NO communication coming from anyone about what is going on they have every right to speculate as to how the legacy issue is being dealt with.

[747boy]

Clearly you have not offered your support to the right person running the sessions as I know for sure they would accept any offer of support or advice.
Perhaps you need to spend more time on the ground at these sessions as the Eastern region rep? rather the one and only session you attended back in the deep of the winter in February or March Time! Long memories of a cold night under flood lights and Down Jackets! As car as I can remember you did not introduce yourself as the Eastern Rep to the coach in charge that night.

As far as witnessed at Grandtully you actually went out of your way not to speak or even communicate with the coach in charge of this program? Perhaps you need to question yourself to whether you are doing the right thing for the region?
So don't write garbage of you don't know what is happening at LV when you can't be axxxd to speak to the coach or attend the odd session. Regeneration of slalom competition in this area is a priority for GB Canoeing, I am not sure where your or the regions priorities are?

As a parent of a child in this program I am disgusted by the comments that are made on this forum when clearly the majority of you have never attended the sessions or have no idea of what exactly is happening on the ground at LV.

If you want to make comment, come and experience it first hand rather than write absolute garbage on this forum when you have no clue of what is really happening other than reading press articles.

A frustrated 747boy

[rich hounslow]

Personally, I'm excited by what is happening at Lee Valley. A club IS being set up and I have no doubt that once the facilities are in place, they will be more than happy to take anyone into the fold.
On a daily basis I see kids ranging from 11-18 playing on the flat, the legacy channel and the Olympic course. Many of their parents are also becoming heavily involved and some are even taking coaching courses. Sounds like a strong start to a lasting legacy to me!
But it doesn't stop there, its not just the kids that are enjoying this amazing facility we have, the sessions that GB Canoeing have been putting on (including coaching) have attracted people in their 50s!
The majority of the Olympic venues have been either down-sized or completely dismantled, whilst Lee Valley is being expanded! Lets not take the short-term view on legacy that the media seem to be taking. Instead, how about we wait for the facility to become fully operational in mid November, at which point it will be able to cater for the legacy that we all want to see.

Remember, just because you haven't been told its happening, doesn't mean it isn't! LVRPA, GB Canoeing and the BCU have plenty of expertise and experience for building a new club. If you really want to know more details about what they are doing, I'm thinking a direct email would be better than posting on a chat page they probably don't even read!

[BaldockBabe]

Hummm... Now I am very confused. Went out of my way to not talk to the coach at Tully? I think you will find that due to a shortage of volunteers I was alternating between start and section judging from the moment the event started until it ended on both days. There were no breaks in the timetable. I managed one wee break on each day. By the time we had sorted out the kit on the Sat evening if was time for dinner. After the event finished on Sunday I took down the timing kit and started my journey home. At what point did I have time to ignore anyone?

Unfortunately due to work commitments I have not been able to attend an evening session so the person you talked about attending one winter evening was not me.

If someone offers help does it matter who they are? Do they have to say that they are the regional Rep for their offer to be more valid? I am happy to step down if you would like to step up?

I do not think this is the place to make personal attacks. John started this thread because he had concerns and as someone who has been very active is setting up clubs, he didn't want an opportunity to be missed. I responded because I understood the concerns. This clearly shows that there is a lack of communication. At no point did we make personal attacks. At no point can I see that anyone has bashed GB canoeing - many of us have good links with them and respect what they do.