SEVEN young people from Launceston and Camelford swimming clubs have recently come back from a training camp in Fuerteventura.

Marlo Downs, Josh Eccles, Gigi Greathead, Lucy Steven, Logan Chatterjea, Bryluen Cowling and Morenwyn Cowling were all given the opportunity to travel with the training squad.

In total there were 34 swimmers, five coaches and three team managers. The swimmers made up a training team of talented South West athletes, who trained, for six hours a day, in a dedicated sporting resort in ‘Las Playitas’.

The swimmers really appreciated the constant ‘buzz’ of inspiration, as there was serious sporting activity almost everywhere they looked. They trained in the pool alongside teams from Belgium, Germany and Scandinavian nations. There were also other teams of cyclists, triathletes, runners, footballers and rugby players, all training beside them.

The week’s training offered an intense programme that cannot be achieved in the home pool environment and although it was only seven days long, the effects of training will show benefits for the next year and longer, with increased achievements in relation to qualifying times for county, regional and national events.

The swimmers have also gained a more positive attitude to training, improved technical stroke and skills, better understanding of the use of land training sessions and the opportunity of training in a fifty metre pool, which is absent from Cornish leisure facilities.

Going to Fuerteventura also allowed swimmers to gain so much in their personal development. Travelling without their parents in a group of their team peers, offered them the opportunity to be independent, whilst under the supervision of experienced team managers.

The training group spanned from the age of eight to 22, allowing social skills and potentially lifelong friendships to be formed. They had to live with, and get along with, roommates who were not family, exposing them to slightly different ways that people conduct their lives.

The swimmers already had great discipline and high expectations of themselves; this training camp environment offered them the opportunity of intense training in a top class facility, in the warmer weather, with like-minded people.

Swimmers attended two two-hour sessions daily; pre-pool and post-pool mobilisation or a run and age-appropriate dry-side training in the gym, using state of the art equipment.

Following the activities on a GB or England training camp, swimmers must rest in their rooms in the afternoon and this was enforced for a period each afternoon, which also allowed swimmers to catch up on homework and study if they needed to.

Many who came were part way through GCSE courses but schools had released them, seeing the real value in the holistic training.

Swimmers were offered group activities from after dinner at 7.30pm but lights out for all was before 9.30pm to ensure all were fit for swimming again at seven o’clock in the morning.

Head coach of North Cornwall Dragons, Helen Tooley, has been taking swimmers of all abilities on domestic and international training camps for over 20 years.

She was joined by a squad of qualified team managers from Bodmin, Wadebridge and Launceston, who attended Amateur Swimming Association courses and safeguarding courses, in order to qualify them in their important role. The swimmers were completely safe at all times and were offered a structured programme of training.

On this occasion, two ex-Olympians, Steve Beckerleg and Jemma Lowe, also attended to give the young people the benefit of their huge combined experience and add a different perspective to the training with their real-life stories of how they had trained with Team GB and the expectations of swimmers who reach national and international competition levels.

Team manager for the trip, Helen Cowling, said: “Our huge thanks go to Launceston Rotary Club who sponsored many of the swimmers from Launceston, when they were approached earlier in the year to assist with our fundraising. Children had to contribute £600 for their place on the camp, flight, food and accommodation. Without the Rotary’s support, for some of the young people, this would have been impossible.”

Many other organisations including Launceston Lions, Launceston Ladies Circle, Launceston Youth Coucil, The Plymouth Battisborough Trust and the Tavistock ‘Fostering Foundation’ also sponsored different members of the team, in order to make their attendance possible.

Many others gave individual donations or contributions of things to sell when table top sales and car boots galore, earlier in the year and those contributions raised further funds.

Helen continued: “As a group we would like to say a huge ‘thank you’. It is hoped that further trips will run in coming years, to be inclusive of all children in swimming clubs across Cornwall but these young people were lucky to be on one of the first trips run from the county to include young people from the Launceston area and they have gained enormously both in terms of their sporting achievements and their confidence levels.

“So, thank you, one and all, for all the support, financial assistance and encouragement that we have been given throughout the last 12 months. Please know that your contributions were so very much appreciated.”