Great news is that I've had a phone call this morning from Alex Scoular of British Cycling, to say that we have achieved the Clubmark accreditation. We are the first cycling club in the North West region and the first cycle speedway club in the UK to get this award. To date, I am only aware of a club in Sussex that has gained the award out of all the cycling clubs in the UK.

This really is a major achievement for us, and I would like to thank ALL club members for their part in achieving this, for this is only granted to clubs in the truest sense of the word.

We need to arrange with BC a date and venue for a formal presentation, along with BC officials, the Mayor, Chairman of Wigan Borough Sports Council and the local press for a photo shoot. BC also want our club officials to be their guests on the track centre at the Revolution 8 meeting on 26th February.

In the meantime I've prepared a brief statement for BC to use in their official announcement of the accreditation.

"We are delighted to receive this prestigious accreditation, as this confirms that Sport England and British Cycling consider us to have met their criteria for being a quality club. We see this accreditation as being an important tool in increasing recruitment, as parents, schools and other youth organisations can be confident in the knowledge that youngsters taking part in our club's activities will be properly cared for. We have also learned a great deal about good practice from going through the accreditation process, and have incorporated several of Sports England's and British Cycling's good practice models into our own activities. I would strongly recommend other clubs to follow suit and work hard to carry out the improvements necessary to acquire the Clubmark accreditation."

Mike Hack