Royal seal of approval for the nation’s lockdown coaching heroes

The coaches, who were voted by the public for their innovations and achievements to keep people moving during the coronavirus lockdowns, each received a memento from UK Coaching’s Royal Partron, HRH The Princess Royal to mark the considerable difference they made to people’s mental and physical well-being.

The winners were:

The nation’s PE teacher Joe Wicks and double Olympic gold medallist Dame Kelly Holmes received the largest number of nominations from the public for the awards, and were highly commended by UK Coaching on the night for using their profiles to coach online fitness and activity sessions to adults and children.

As the country was placed into successive lockdowns to stem the spread of coronavirus, Wicks ran his famous ‘PE with Joe’ series on YouTube, keeping mums, dads and kids engaged in physical activity despite being at home, meanwhile, Dame Holmes took her Military in Motion programme online to support and encourage her participants through a solid seven months of fitness and running sessions, even involving her Alpacas in the fun.

"Helping people to use sport and physical activity positively through challenging times is a privilege and one which carries huge responsibilities, and you took your duties seriously, using your initiative to create solutions to the embargo on most sport and physical activity – looking always to what was possible – thank you.”

“Naturally, the stories of our ‘lockdown coaches’ were so good that tens of thousands of people used their thumbs to give kudos to their favourite coach. And what a wide-ranging group of winners we have: from producing a footballing booklet backed by Champions League winner Ronald de Boer to creating your own physiotherapy sessions for children with muscular dystrophy as a child yourself, not to mention the hours of Zoom sessions, quizzes and fundraising.  

“You supported, guided and inspired people to achieve goals and transform their lives through something unprecedented. We’re incredibly proud of you – well done.”  

UK Coaching opened nominations to its UK Coaching Hero awards initiative in 2020 after the first major UK-wide COVID-19 lockdown. The charitable organisation wanted to acknowledge the efforts of coaches, who in difficult circumstances persevered and re-thought coaching techniques to deliver legal digital and one-to-one training, utilising sport and physical activity to keep people connected.

From 500 public nominations, a long list of 75 coaches from 65 different places around the UK and representing nearly 40 sports and activities were chosen for public vote. During UK Coaching Week 2021, the British voted for their favourite coach and over 65,000 votes were cast in the ballot.