Ladies who launch! I Will If You Will boosts local sports clubs

The I Will If You Will (IWIYW) Community Fund has helped boost a number of sports clubs across Bury who are encouraging women and girls to get active.

Elton Sailing Club successfully bid for £297 from the IWIYW Community Fund after Lisa Moore, the club’s membership secretary, applied for funding to enhance the club’s facilities and equipment.

After finding out the funding bid was successful, Lisa said: “The club desperately needed new buoyancy aids and without the IWIYW Community Fund we would have had to find ways to fundraise which can be very difficult and time consuming.”

The funding went towards buying ten new buoyancy aids to keep the club up to date with health and safety regulations, assuring top quality sailing and peace of mind for all members.

I Will If You Will (IWIYW) – the Bury-based female fitness movement delivered by Bury Council with National Lottery funds from Sports England – works in partnership with local businesses, sports clubs, schools, voluntary groups and social organisations to get more women and girls more active, more often.

Lisa said: “We’ve been running the ‘women only’ sailing sessions for three years and, since we started working in partnership with IWIYW, we’ve had more females take to the water for the first time than ever before, thanks to their marketing support and funding opportunities.”

For the ladies who launch, the fun doesn’t stop when the sailing season comes to an end during the winter months.

To help keep members active when it’s too cold and dark to take the boats out on the reservoir, the club sought help from IWIYW to set up a weekly pilates class after members thought it would be a great alternative to sailing.

Using the facilities available at Elton Sailing Club, IWIYW helped the club find a qualified pilates instructor and provided funding to cover the cost of the instructor for the first six weeks until the activity became sustainable.

Within just three months, the pilates class became so popular among members and non-members alike that the club has added another evening pilates session to its weekly activity timetable.

To find out more about the IWIYW community fund, visit: www.iwillifyouwill.co.uk or call 0161 253 5893. To find out more about Elton Sailing club, visit: www.eltonsailingclub.co.uk

ENDS

Press release issued: 16 March 2016.

Note to editors:

About I Will If You Will

I Will If You Will is focused on changing women’s and girls’ behaviours towards taking part in sport and physical activity with the aim of getting more women and girls being more active, more often, and helping improve the health and wellbeing of people in Bury.

It aims to overcome the many practical and emotional barriers to being active, while encouraging women to support each other by joining the I Will If You Will community.

The Phase One campaign (2013–14) was delivered by Bury Council with £2.3 million of National Lottery funding from Sport England. For the Phase Two campaign (2015–16), Sport England has allocated a further £2 million to extend delivery.

The successful IWIYW pilot campaign identified valuable insight and helped develop the foundations for Sport England’s national This Girl Can campaign, which launched in January 2015, as well as Sport England’s practical guide to helping women and girls get active (www.sportengland.org/womenandgirls).