Tai Jutsu Leeds Sportivate success
Published on: 31st August 2011
In July Leeds City Council Sport Development Unit in partnership with Tai Jutsu Leeds offered 6 weeks of free Martial Arts training from 6.00pm to 7.30pm at South Leeds Youth Hub.
Led by the highly experienced and acclaimed Sensei Sean Mc Hale these sessions were bound to be in high demand, whilst being delivered at the all new and exciting South Leeds Youth Hub – an ideal combination of exhilaration and quality.
The project was established by Mike Shucksmith, Sport and Young People Development Officer, based on the feedback from Sensei Sean. Sean had identified an opportunity for delivery in the City in a deprived area.
Sean’s experience as a former World Champion and the Scottish National Coach were ideal selling points!!
The South Leeds Youth Hub was not operational when the project feasibility started, but the venue sat ideally in the right location and its facilities were first class. With Sportivate funding being available and the bid successful the combination of location, facility, instructor and activity all seemed to fit.
The project started on the 13th July and the Hub was ready. The small activity room was totally swamped with new participants. Immediately negotiations took place with the Youth Service to relocate the activity into the larger downstairs room in full view of other Hub users for week 2 and still new members arrived. The numbers peeked at a maximum of 32 participants!
Advertisements and information on these sessions were displayed / added to web sites at Barnado’s, West Yorkshire Police, Breeze Cultural Network, Breeze Web Site, Leeds City Council’s Well Being Newsletter, West Yorkshire Sport web site, Leeds Metropolitan University, the NSPCC and Church halls.
Feedback on the sessions has been fantastic. Indeed Sean has been contacted to deliver activities for Leeds City Council as part of the planned Well Being Week.
Steve Marsden, Assistant Finance Manager wrote:‘’I saw the free taster sessions advertised in the July Health & Wellbeing newsletter and on reflection I thought I’d give it a go because whilst I’m quite fit, I swim 2.5 kilometres per week, I wanted some more keep-fit that wasn’t so solitary, used more concentration, a possible stress buster, and would help with my confidence”.
“I want to feel that if faced with an attack I could at least try to defend myself. And that’s the operative word, ‘defence’, as the very friendly and supportive instructor Sean made clear this is about using your opponent’s strength and momentum against them; in no way is this about aggression. In fact whilst giving out instruction a lot of the time Sean stresses that if a technique buys you space and time to get away that’s all to the good, it is not about ‘mixing it’ “.
“So all I did was turn up at the session armed with a t-shirt, shorts and enthusiasm nothing else is required as the providers have all the equipment to keep you safe. You do have to do a bit of a warm up at the start though so as not to get any strains or pulls but they are not too strenuous with just a little bit of physical effort required. The one and half hour session positively flew by; mainly because it is so enjoyable with Sean’s very supportive and humorous banter.
“At the end of the first and the second session that I subsequently went to, I felt tired but not drained, had a sense of achievement and well-being and while it’s early days yet it has given me confidence in my physical abilities to defend myself if needed”.
“As for myself, after the freebies are over I now intend to take this up long term with the club that Sean is part of”.
The age ranges attending were also very varied; from small 5 year old children to 50 year old new starters; we also had Special Constables in attendance honing their skills.
With many of the participants intending to continue with their training at the Hub, this project has evolved from infancy to a club with sustainability – Sport Development at its best.
Mike ShucksmithMike.shucksmith@leeds.gov.uk0113 3952376
