London 2012 blog

The Ipswich Gymnastics Centre in the East of England serves community as well as sporting interests.

It is an elite facility which has hosted a number of high level international gymnastics events, including with countries from as far afield as Brazil.

But on the day of the East of England launch of the Pre Games Training Camps Guide on Monday, there was also a large Mother and Toddler group making excellent use of the facilities. The bouncy floors have a very real dual purpose when it comes to a group of toddlers.

Chair of the Nations and Regions Group, Charles Allen, the multiple Gold Medallist swimmer, Karen Pickering, and Essex County Councillor Stephen Castle, were the party of luminaries in Ipswich to launch the Pre-Games Training Camps Guide.

Karen, Charles, Stephen and venue manager Andy Wood resting on the beam with the young gymnasts:

At an event with significant media interest, all three spoke about the fantastic opportunities being in the Guide presented to the 65 venues from the East of England who would be in it. Venues including: the Essex County Cricket Club which had bid to host Archery; the University of Cambridge which had also bid to host Archery but Athletics and Fencing too; the Stevenage Arts and Leisure Centre which could host Basketball, Table Tennis and Wrestling; and the Great Leighs Racecourse, which would host Equestrian events.

All three speakers recognised the significant achievement for the region from having so many venues in the Guide. But all said that the real prize would be becoming a Training Camp. This would be the real measure of success. It would require some more effort. But for the moment, the region could be proud that so many venues had been assessed, against a very rigorous set of technical criteria, as being suitable for inclusion in the Pre-Games Training Camp Guide.

The party then had a tour of the really impressive venue with Andy Wood, the venue Manager, and saw some high quality sporting equipment being used by some highly promising young gymnasts, who were naturally looking to compete in London in 2012.

And then there were the toddlers, who clearly won’t make 2012, but may well in time experience both the community and elite sport purposes of the venue, and in doing so set themselves up for a gold, silver or bronze medal to take back to their home town of Ipswich, sometime in the 2020s...