Our Awards

Andrew Joyce (water sports)

As England Adaptive Para-Surf Manager from 2017, Andrew has worked to ensure that adaptive surfing was still possible despite the complications of the pandemic. He helped to arrange training sessions for small groups of adaptive surfers, and over the last year he initiated and led the first Adaptive Surfing Roadshow in the UK, in order to allow more disabled people to try adaptive surfing for the first time.

Joe Lockley (boxing)

Joe leads Bright Star Boxing Academy, which focuses on supporting those in need through the power of sport. As part of his efforts to champion community sport, Joe has created programmes and sessions for people across many vulnerable groups, such as those who struggle to manage their mental health, those in recovery, those at risk of exploitation, and abuse survivors.

Rhona Wilson (multi-sport)

Rhona's coaching roles centre on working with young people who have barriers in their life stopping them from reaching their full potential, especially in a sport environment. To fully understand the needs of participants, Rhona conducted important research and led informal consultation sessions with young people, with a long-term vision to continually improve provision to support their community.

Marc Tamlyn (archery)

Marc coaches over one hundred individuals each week, and his desire to go above and beyond during the pandemic ensured school archery coaching and clubs could continue safely. Once more group activities were possible, Marc restarted coaching, modifying shooting procedures so that participants could shoot safe at a time when very few other social or sporting activities were available for young people.

Marcus Cabeca (capoeira)

Marcus has coached Capoeira for 16 years – and has founded his own school where he has introduced his students to not only technical aspects of the martial art, but with an educational focus on the aesthetic of the sport, the afro-Brazilian culture, the Portuguese language and the music associated with it. Aside Capoeira, Marcus has also founded a Kingston-based charitable organisation using creative thinking to build community cohesion.

Sean Ross (boxing)

Sean is the founder of the East Hull Boxing Academy. Since taking up boxing himself aged 10, he recognised it was sport that had kept him on the right path in life and wanted to provide that same opportunity for others in the Hull area. Sean has achieved this and more. The club now have their very own European silver medallist – the first club to have had a European female champion in Hull’s history.

Alice Tribedi (multi-sport)

As a professional dancer with a foot injury, Alice was told that she would never walk again – yet after hard work, training, and qualifications, she actively coaches dance/exercise for those aged 60, all the way up to 93. Alice provided her classes free for several months during the lockdowns – prioritising access to emotional and mental health support.

Tania Skerritt (multi-sport)

Tania is the Well-being Navigator for the residents of the Inspired Villages Group retirement village at Great Alne Park. When lockdown was imposed upon the UK, she ensured that householders had a set of basic equipment at home and set up a varied schedule of classes that could be accessed via Zoom. Tania also arranged for a Eddie ‘the Eagle’ Edwards to visit the village to help inspire her participants, with Eddie engaging in one of her exercise classes.

Yvonne Bignall (Nordic Walking and multi-sport)

Yvonne led two programmes during the Covid pandemic as regulations allowed – with each of the programmes supporting participants with a wide variety of additional needs including autism, schizophrenia, and partial sight, plus older participants with physical limitations from knee or hip injuries. Yvonne also created an online introduction to Nordic Walking to inform any beginners to the sport.

Craig Morris (canoe slalom)

Craig helped his whole training squad of three athletes to qualify for the Tokyo Olympics – all the more impressive with just four spots available. This was an Olympic debut for each of the three athletes, with all three making their final, and Mallory Franklin taking home the first GB Silver medal in women’s C1.

Richard Morris (para-badminton)

Richard returned from the Paralympic Games in Tokyo having led the team to a silver and bronze medal on the sport’s debut at the Paralympics. In addition to his success over the summer, Richard has coached players to numerous World and European Championship titles. Having worked hard to put Para-Badminton on the map, the sport has an exciting future with Richard at the helm.  

Scott Hann MBE (gymnastics)

Scott is Director of Coaching at South Essex Gymnastics Club, leads the performance Artistic Gymnastics programme in Scotland, and is personal coach to several elite gymnasts, including Max Whitlock MBE. Scott supported both gymnasts and coaches throughout the pandemic, making sure they were able to stay active and connected, including delivering coaching forums around Great Britain.

Josh Atkins (swimming)

Josh is the lead performance coach for Wycombe District Swimming Club, leading the Intermediate Performance Squad, which features swimmers aged 12-17 that are National Level. He is also responsible for the Talent ID of swimmers within the club’s programme. In 2021, the club had six swimmers selected to represent GB at the European Junior Open Water Championships – making up half the 12-strong team.

Julie Maiden (netball)

Julie is both head coach of MK Dons and MK Netters and has achieved outstanding results producing young talent in her sport. She has used her coaching expertise to not only set a strong foundation for netball development in her region, but to have a wider positive social impact. Julie has achieved this by working with social justice charity Nacro to tackle youth crime and set up multiple youth projects with Councils and Sports Partnerships.

Matthew Puddy (swimming)

A swimming coach from Millfield School who is always smiling and who, despite exceptional success with his team, insists that on race day he prioritises having fun with his athletes. This year, he has coached a group of 30+ athletes at Regional level and above, and 10 of Matt's squad were selected for the National Development Programme.

Hannah Campbell (triathlon & swimming)

As soon as the pandemic began, Hannah proposed to Stirling Triathlon club that she run live Zoom turbo for the children, on an entirely voluntary basis. In the second lockdown, she continued to run online sessions but also started up a podcast called Sporting Routes, talking to inspirational athletes, plus a channel for young members to discuss mental health in sport.

Kieran Trimmer (swimming)

To keep morale high during the lockdowns, each week Kieran delivered a fun session on Zoom which ranged from treasure hunts to quizzes – putting his swimmers’ mental and emotional well-being first and bringing the group together, even while apart. Looking after around 60 children per session, Kieran also embedded a developmental element to his online sessions, as he built up the children's knowledge on each exercise.

Tor Freeman (basketball)

Tor, who coaches St Albans U16s girls’ basketball team, made a choice to focus on coaching girls due to the lack of performance level opportunities for girls in the sport. Taking the pandemic complications in his stride, he kept his players engaged through a number of online activities: speaker sessions, video training sessions, video analysis, games, challenges and fitness activities – not missing a single session.

Andi Revell (gymnastics)

Andi is a High-Performance Trampoline Coach at AAAsports, where he leads mentors and develops a team of more than 20 coaches in various disciplines. As a high-performance coach for over ten years, Andi’s passion has evolved from coaching to coach development. During the pandemic, Andi launched an interactive delivery system for classes, which he trained coaches to use, and worked with British Gymnastics to transfer existing qualifications into virtual courses.

Andrew Noble (multi-sport)

Andrew has been Development Manager at the Arches School Sport Partnership since 2013, where he works to provide physical education, sport, and physical activity opportunities for primary school children throughout Sheffield. Andrew is responsible for the recruitment, training and development of all Arches coaches – actively mentoring coaches and creating personal development plans to help support them on their coaching journey.

Wasim Collins (multi-sport)

Wasim works for Lifetime Training as a Learning Coach, where his role is to train sports coaches up to deliver the highest quality coaching and support for participants in the local community. He has focused on passing on his knowledge from working in the most deprived areas of Newcastle – and with the hardest to reach children – to the next generation of coaches coming through the organisation’s ranks.

Access Sport Wingz Disability Inclusion Project

Recognising a shortcoming in inclusion and accessibility training for coaches, the project addresses the issue at source, encouraging the cycling workforce to embrace an inclusive and pan-disability approach. The project has trained over 150 coaches, instructors and volunteers to date, improving their confidence, skills and understanding.

Our Parks

Last year, Our Parks created Couch to Fitness, an online, on demand fitness programme which featured a diverse cast of personal trainers to help communities get active at home in their own time and at their own pace. This programme saw over 100,000 people take part, the majority of which were women and girls – going above and beyond to empower them through the power of community coaching.

Boing Kids

Boing is a project that supports coaches and educators, who in turn support young people. Their approach emphasises physical literacy as key to the process of development and embraces a constraints-led approach to pedagogy to elicit problem-based learning opportunities. As part of their PLAYUP initiative, in collaboration with Sport England and the Magic Academy, Boing produced a video series featuring child-friendly game ideas to incorporate into coaching sessions.

Coach Core Foundation

Coach Core is an employment and education charity that uses a community sports apprenticeship to target young adults not in employment, education or training. This year, to prevent the pandemic stalling the essential development of upcoming trainees, the project delivered the first live-streamed End Point Assessments for Community Activator qualification in the UK, to allow learners to complete their apprenticeships.

Our Parks

Our Parks was created to break down barriers to exercise and since 2014, the initiative has focused specifically on working with ethnically diverse communities and lower socio-economic groups. As part of its Couch to Fitness programme launched this year, marginalised groups were motivated to remain physically active during the pandemic.