Sneinton Business Forum

Well done Becky Adlington, double Olympic Champion and World Record holder in the 800m Freestyle.

On a glorious weekend for British sport the highlight was Notts girl Becky Adlington breaking a 19 year old world record – the oldest in Swimming. Becky has been training with county club Nova Centurions 4 hours a day for the past 6 years.

To show our appreciation for her hard won achievements there will be an open top bus tour of Mansfield on Tuesday, August 26. It will leave the Civic Centre in Mansfield at 6pm and travel down West Gate to the Market Square.

But besides her perserverence of effort and the support of her family, what else contributed to her success?
The county council has invested in excess of £1m a year in Swimming. They invest far more than any other county council in the country. And young swimmers with talent are fed into high level squads to work alongside the top coaches.

Sherwood Swimming Baths in Mansfield (now to be re-named in her honour) has recently had a £4.5m upgrade. At the same time the City council was seeking to close Victoria Baths. Becky and the Nova Centurions train in Victoria Baths and Becky has said in an interview: “it’s closing in the next couple of months. So we’re having to go somewhere else.”

So could we really expect the next Becky to come from the East of the City, Sneinton or St Anne’s ? This Olympics has shown that well directed investment does produce results, so Sneinton Business Forum call on the council to either invest in Victoria Leisure Centre as a local sports facility for our youngsters or build a new one in the local area as part of the new City Academy planned for Carlton Road.

But can the City really close Victoria, an historic facility now made even more historic through it connection to one of our greatest althetes?

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