Seymour Back to the pool

Aim

To raise funds to get our swimmers back into the pool, temp support members who have lost jobs and enable us to keep the sport inclusive

Seymour Artistic Swimming is a non profit club providing outstanding artistic swimming  (synchro) coaching to its approx. 90 members. We have both recreational and competitive swimmers.

We are also the oldest Artistic Swimming Club in the UK, due to celebrate 60 years next year! Our club founder Dawn Zajac brought the sport back from the USA teaching at Seymour Baths, where the club got it's name. We are also very fortunate that some of those swimmers that were taught by Dawn herself now coach at the club!

Our members come from diverse backgrounds around London. We cater for athletes of all abilities who wish to develop and impove their performances through athlete focussed and structred coaching. We have have swimmers as young as 7 through to adults.

The opportunities in our club are wide. We provide a pathway for our swimmers from learning the basics through to Internaltional competitions and everything in between. 7 of our swimmers are aiming for GB youth team trials next year!

The club aims to meet all these needs, providing the opportunity for youngsters and adults to excel and for many to reach their dreams.

The Impact of COVID-19

COVID-19 brought an abrupt end to training and competitions for the club and its members.

At point of lockdown several of our juniors had just completed in the Age National Championships winning several gold, silver and bronze medals in individuals, duets, figures and team events and were preparing for the Regionals, Combo Cup and Scottish Championships. our Masters were preparing for National and European Championships. 

Due to COVID-19 we were not able to bring in our normal funding to help with running costs so fees are kept accesssible and so that we can continue to support some members during temporary times of hardship.

The club and its coaches have worked hard to keep the members engaged during lockdown and quickly set up several land training sessions per week to ensure fitness levels were maintained and the swimmers were able to talk to their teammates.

Pools Reopening

When we were briefly allowed to go back to the pool it was amazing to see the swimmers and coaches who are used to spending significant time together seeing each other for the first time in months. 

However, costs of returning to the pool have gone up signicantly and numbers allowed in the pool at any one time has been considerably reduced to allow for social distancing. There has been a great deal of work reorganising timetables and finding pool when our pool at the Queen Mother Leisure Centre announced it's temporary closure.

Why are we Crowd Funding?

With the loss of revenue from this year from our normal fund raising ventures and the additional costs of returning to the pool, the clubs present income does not cover the costs. As with so many sporting clubs, the impacts of COVID are presenting many challenges to resolve.

As the oldest Artistic Swimming Club in the UK it is important to the club to ensure membership is accessible to all. We wish to avoid meeting all of the additional costs borne from the impacts of COVID through increasing membership fees, as we believe this could discourage new members and may not be viable for all. Additionally, we wish to be able to support all our members through this difficult time, which includes those financially impacted by this crisis, to ensure that all members can return to the pool and joining Seymour Artistic Swimming Club to remain open to all swimmers. It is also important that the club remains financially secure in the long term so as to continue to grow and provide the very best opportunities for swimmers to train in the only Artistic Swimming Club in Central London.

We have set a target and hope that Sport England will match fund half of this through the Activity Together scheme. This is a massive target and very ambitious, but we are an ambitious bunch. The club and all its members are looking to the future, when competitions can restart and dreams can remain alive.

This short video I think will help explain how much the sport means to our swimmers.

Who will you be helping?

Anything you can spare will help us ensure that Seymour remains the great club it was before COVID, to be financially accessible and to help us continue to build and develop so as to provide the best opportunities for our present members and those of the future.

Your donations will help all of these people:

• Young children looking to take their artistic swimming further
• Children starting out competing
• Children and Young adults competing at County, Regional, National and International Level
• Swimmers / athletes with disabilities
• Swimmers suffering from financial hardships of COVID-19

THANK YOU!

Note: Raffle draw will be held at the end of the fund raising campaign by our club chairwoman.

This project successfully funded on 29th January 2021