A gymnastics coach from Street has been singled out for national recognition for her work in providing a safe haven for all children at the club.

Kelly Lockyer, 53, is a safeguarding officer at Griffin Association Gymnastics and Trampolining and won the Safe Sport prize at the British Gymnastics Awards.

Lockyer’s role means she ensures that all gymnasts at the club are safe, happy and healthy both in and out of the club, providing support to young athletes and their families if and when needed.

She said: “It’s difficult to big it up and big myself up because it’s not about me, it’s about the role and how it’s making the children feel safe, that they’re in a safe place and they can come and just forget about everything else that’s going on.

“If they need somebody to talk to, then they know that we’re there and we’re almost their trusted adult while they’re away from home.

“I think especially in this day and age, there’s a lot of stresses on the children. The children sometimes can’t talk to their parents about how they’re feeling and their parents' worries are affecting them.

“They just sometimes need to offload it to somebody else and for people to say: ‘We are listening to you, we are here.’

“There are things we can do and put in place to help them – we are up for doing that with the consent of the parents. We just want to help the children to be and feel safe, and enjoy what they’re doing and relax.”

The British Gymnastics Awards are community led and about championing those who make the sport an uplifting experience for all, with more nominations than ever before coming in this year.

It is the creativity, dedication and passion from people in the sport that make gymnastics an accessible, inclusive and enjoyable sport for all.

The nominations were judged by panels made up of British Gymnastics committee members and external panellists from across UK Sport, Gymnova, Milano, Gymaid, Youth Sport Trust, Sport England, Women in Sport, The Include Summit, Sport and Recreation Alliance, The Sport for Development Coalition and GB gymnasts.

Lockyer added: “I don’t do it for the recognition, I do it because some people need somewhere to go and some children need someone they can trust to talk to.”

The British Gymnastics Awards celebrate those at the heart of gymnastics who create an uplifting experience for all. British Gymnastics has launched a new vision for a new era of gymnastics, learn more about Leap Without Limits here - https://www.british-gymnastics.org/vision