Chester-le-Street Community Indoor Rowing Project

Who are we?

CLSARC has been operating on the river wear at Chester-le-Street since 1888, we are a club open to all ages and pride ourselves on remaining an affordable access route to the sport of rowing. 

The club is ran entirely by it's excellent volunteers who kindly give up hundreds of hours a year to support our junior and senior rowing members

The club has had a large amount of success at local, national and international events and we are hoping to have our first Olympic representation at Paris 2024 with Lauren Irwin who learned to row at the club and has since moved on to be a full time GB Rowing Team athlete.

Why are we crowdfunding?

We are above all else a community club doing our best to support the people of Chester-le-Street, we have a great membership already at the club however we want to do more and work with more people from more backgrounds who may be interested in rowing, fitness or just coming along for a chat and a coffee.

Given our centralized location, ease of access and great facilities we now want to open our doors to our entire community including local schools, men's health groups, charities who need accessible training facilities and other similar projects for the people of Chester-le-Street.

We plan to offer our indoor rowing sessions free of charge to these organized groups and also support them with a British Rowing qualified coach who can show them the ropes and get everyone enjoying rowing at the club.

How we’ll spend the money raised

In the simplest way possible, in order to deliver indoor rowing we need rowing machines! our plan is to invest in 5 additional rowing machines so we can maximize our space and deliver to groups of 20+ people at a time.

Our previous machines have lasted over 10 years so we hope this crowdfund can help support us for the next decade too.

Our room is ready and waiting for some new rowing machines, take a look at the images below

Community impact

The club currently supports members from year 7 (12 years old) through to members in their 70's whilst doing our best to make an environment suitable for all who may want to row.

Our new indoor rowing program will allow us to offer health based activities to groups who are either under our minimum age for on the water rowing, or may not be able to access the river or the sport due to other limitations. Alongside what may be the benefit of training indoors during the frozen winters!

Alongside our planned indoor rowing program we also plan to operate coffee mornings for people and passers by who have either finished their training for the day or would like to come and watch some rowing from the river bank.

Testimonials

We have also sampled some of our membership feedback below

"The club welcomed in my daughter and have been absolutely fantastic...She had never sat in a boat and was nervous at first. The coaching team are professional and inspirational and have encouraged her to develop both personally and with her early rowing journey. The club has a lovely warm family feel that we are blessed to be part of"

"Being able to attend the club with like-minded individuals and have social interactions several nights a week, especially in the dark winter nights, is an excellent opportunity for members. It's brilliant for not only physical health but mental health too. Speaking as someone who does hybrid working, it's great to get out amongst people and work out at the same time. CLSARC as a club is always supportive and encouraging and there's always someone there to help you dig a little deeper in the last few hundred meters be that a coach or other members"

"My two sons have been members at CLSARC for just over a year. My eldest is building his racing confidence and attends every session he can - the coaching team are all fantastic and push him to do his best in a way that seems to really resonate with him. There’s something about the club that has utterly drawn him in and I’m so pleased that he’s found his thing. My youngest had a rough patch after taking a swim but, again, the coaching team encouraged him and pushed him in the right direction and he’s now up to racing which I never thought I would see. The family feel around the place and encouragement between members and parents is just fantastic."

How you can play your part

There are four simple ways to help us reach our target, and make this project a reality.

1. Make a pledge. Don’t delay if you’re going to support us because momentum is key to our success!

2. Spread the word. Share our project on your social media pages and tell the world to get behind us! The more people we reach, the more support we will get.

3. Offer rewards. Get involved if you are a local business by donating things we can offer to our supporters. We will give you a shout out!

4. Fundraise for us. If you want to run your own fundraiser – maybe a sponsored activity or similar – use the 'contact project' button at the top of our page to let us know. Setting up your own page only takes a few minutes and you won’t need any bank details. Just a fun idea!