Harrogate Tri have embraced the return to play, holding both junior and adult sessions in social bubbles to allow members to get back into multisport action.

The club’s return to activity began with running sessions using a technique coach and splitting into groups of five athletes. Shortly afterwards, in early July, open water swimming began at the local quarry, but only after Viv Meville, the Club Chair, and Eleanor Williams, the club’s Covid Officer, reviewed and compiled the risk and Covid-19 assessments.

“Usually we only do outdoor swimming on a Monday night but we’re now able to run sessions on Saturdays too as members are keen to get back into the water,” Viv commented. “For those who are less confident in open water, we’ve begun confidence boosting sessions too.”

Viv was delighted when a local swimming pool reopened to allow the club to begin hosting sessions for its members, saying: “We have a very active membership. Members have been really eager to get involved and, right now, we are using this time where we can’t huff and puff to get our swimming technique right.

“Members signed up to a block of eight swimming sessions with sixteen swimmers in each block across four lanes. Those sessions have been going for two weeks and have gone down really well. We have a waiting list now and we’re running three blocks of eight currently.”

One of the Harrogate Tri Club members, Tom Wynn, has also organised an Intra-Tri competition for Monday 24 August, which has proven very popular with all members who want to test their fitness over the lockdown period.

The return to activity relies on both clubs and members maintaining social distancing and Covid-19 Secure measures being put in place.

“We do have a lot of rules in place. One of the very strict ones is being ‘beach ready’, i.e. getting to the pool, no chatting, get in and do the session and go home,” said Viv.

Discussing the changes that the lockdown has brought upon the sport, Viv said: “Pre-Covid, the club offered strength and conditioning (S&C) and yoga sessions as part of the training schedule, and now we have seen members continuing this training but moving to online classes.

“We are lucky to have an S&C trained member, Emma Kicks, who has led club specific S&C sessions every Thursday evening through the lockdown period. Members also moved to using Zwift in the cycling world.”

One of the challenges the club faces upon its return to activity is managing the variation in fitness levels of both returning members and newcomers to the sport. Viv herself has been home-schooling her children throughout the day whilst working during the evenings, leaving her little time for any training herself.

“There will be people that have been really busy and people that have had massive amounts of time to train,” she commented. “We need to recognise that not everyone has had the opportunity to spend hours on empty roads around Yorkshire.”

The club has been pushing forward in certain areas of membership, with junior athletes now having their own dedicated sessions again.

“It’s been brilliant to see the club’s juniors getting back up and running under the guidance of Head Coach Paddy Craig.  We’ve been doing cycling and running from the beginning of July which has been terrific because nothing else has been open for the kids,” said Viv.

“We have very active and committed junior coaches and a very active membership. The coaches have been brilliant, finding a local space and splitting into social bubbles every week. The kids and the parents have loved it.”

If you would like to share your clubs journey through these strange times, then get in touch with Michelle Scott: michellescott@britishtriathlon.org