The weather was bad but the atmosphere was electric at USW Sports Park for the FCHA tenants sports day!
Over 60 people and their support staff joined us for a day filled with activities and sports that they could try in the hopes that it inspires some to continue with a sports based activity as a hobby.
Boccia
Is a Paralympic sport that involves throwing, kicking or rolling balls towards a target ball called the jack. It's played indoors and at the sports day, we were joined by Tom who is the Boccia Coordinator for Disability Sport Wales who gave tenants instructions on how to play the sport. Find out more about Boccia here
Cricket / Table Cricket
Cricket was set up to get tenants to practice swinging the bats and hitting the balls! This included points for those who hit the green wickets.
Table cricket was also set up in the gym. This involves up to 7 people around a table! one rolling the ball, one batting and then the rest move these white and red sliding pads on the edges of the table to try and stop the ball from hitting the ball. If you manage to block the ball by making it hit the red area of your slider they're out!
Bowls
What looks relatively easy turned out to be the biggest competition of the day! The guys at Bowls Cymru set up a challenge: roll the bowls into the holes, highest score wins! Little did they know how competitive some tenants were as people queued up to get first place! The bowls, however, were not spherical, which made the task that much more challenging.
Tennis
Not your usual tennis, this included more sensory objects to hit with bats and larger bats and balls to give everybody an opportunity to get a great rally going!
The Dance Groups
Two different dance groups joined us on the day, one in the morning (U DO IT! Dance Foundation) and one in the afternoon (Rubicon Dance) each with their different styles of getting tenants involved, and did they get involved! Every tenant spent some time dancing to their favourite songs. You can see how much fun they had in the photos. Can you spot the FCHA staff member?
Golf
Tenants and Staff enjoyed a little practice at some golf thanks to Golff Cymru! A tee was placed on the ground and tenants could hit the ball into a net! There was also a target to keep score. You can find out more about Golf here
Circus Tricks
TK Arts provided circus tricks such as juggling and plate spinning to get tenants to test their fine motor skills! There were at lot of people at this stall learning to juggle and having a whale of a time!
Rise Activities
Rise Life set up some activities in the afternoon to get tenants moving through adapted sports. The more popular one was with pool noodles and a balloon! Seated, tenants would hit the balloon into the opponents goals. Lots of laughs and yells in excitement could be heard coming from here! Find out more on the Rise Life website here!
Sensory Room and Yoga
Finally, upstairs, tenants could relax and settle down with some musical instruments, a sensory room and Yoga. If the activities downstairs in the hall were a little too strenuous, this was where you could go to relax.
Overall, the initial feedback from tenants has been incredibly positive! Hopefully we can continue to do sports days like this in the future. Who knows? Maybe next time the weather will be a bit better and more could be done outside!
