FACILITY MANAGEMENT
Olympic interaction at Sheffield International Venues
When Sheffield International Venues (SIV) hosted international Olympic and Paralympic athletes in the run-up to the London 2012 Games, the facility managers used the opportunity to inspire the local communities and encourage regular participation. Hannah Johnson explains how
Sheffield hosts the EIS’s largest multi-sport venue
Peru’s national volleyball team enjoy Sheffield’s facilities
heffield International Ven- ues (SIV) manages elite sporting and entertainment environments that champion community participation and sport development. With 4.5 million customers and 2,000 events every year, SIV works in partnership with a number of professional teams, sports governing bodies (NGBs) and individual elite ath- letes based at these venues to support their success.
S
It was this reputation for sporting excellence and diversity that attracted more than 250 Olympic and Paralympic athletes from nine international nations to the city for their pre-London 2012 training camps, utilising the facilities at the English Institute of Sport (EIS) – Shef- field, Ponds Forge International Sports Centre and the Motorpoint Arena. Teams including Brazilian boxers, US divers, Chinese table tennis play- ers, Canadian synchronised swimmers, wheelchair basketball and boccia playerss and Korea’s volleyball players and coaches based themselves in the city. Five rhythmic gymnastics teams
including Olympic champions Russia, along with Japan, Korea, Azerbaijan and Uzbekistan, also selected Sheffield as their chosen base prior to the Games.
ELITE FACILITIES
Each venue chosen for training camps of- fered top facilities. Ponds Forge is home to some of the best diving facilities in the country, which includes a 5m depth diving pit with 13 diving platforms, play- back technology and dry-land facilities for training out of the pool. The EIS Sheffield is the largest multi- sport EIS venue in the country. Covering five acres, it boasts a dedicated boxing gym which has been home to GB box- ing for the last seven years – including Olympic champions Nicola Adams, Luke Campbell and Antony Joshua. The Motorpoint Arena provided an ideal environment for the rhythmic gym- nasts due to the large floor area and high ceilings required for their routines.
EASE OF ACCESS
Facility access was key to all the Olympic teams. Provisions were put in place by
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SIV to ensure each venue and its facili- ties met their individual requirements and that they were able to use the areas of the venues they required for their stringent training programmes. Some teams, including the Canadian synchronised swimmers, required closed sessions, so the operations staff had to ensure that these could be accom- modated around SIV’s busy and diverse programme of events and the needs of its customers to ensure minimal disrup- tion within the venue.
During the US divers’ final visit to the city before the Olympics in July, a large national swimming event was taking place in the competition pool at Ponds Forge, which meant the operations team had to ensure the two were able to take place side by side without infringing on the requirements of the US divers. The diving pit was closed off from the competitors and members of the public. However, during the times when the US team weren’t in training, the venue operated as normal to ensure the disruption for others was kept to a mini- mum. Security was also vital during the
Issue 4 2012 © cybertrek 2012
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