Shokk Youth Gyms open in Rochdale borough

Link4Life: Part of the partnership in opening Shokk Youth Gyms in Rochdale

Two state-of-the-art youth gyms have opened at leisure centres in the Borough of Rochdale in a partnership project between Link4Life, Rochdale Council and SHOKK, the youth fitness specialists.

Established in April as a Cultural Trust to provide services for Rochdale Council, Link4Life’s key priorities include improving local facilities and encouraging children and young people to become more physically active. Designed especially to meet the needs of the junior market, these groundbreaking fitness facilities have been installed at Littleborough Sports Centre and Middleton Leisure Centre.

The SHOKK Youth Gym, for 8 to 16 year olds, features unique cardio vascular, resistance and interactive equipment and provides a dedicated place for young people to get fit and have fun in a safe, secure environment under the supervision of qualified staff. The Gym includes multi-player dance mats – with a separate customised dance studio in Middleton - giving children the chance to get fit while sharpening up their dance moves, vew-do balance boards, which are similar to skateboards and give kids the chance to improve their balance and unique youth gym equipment, such as fluid machines, resistance machines and functional weights designed for children.

The overall package on offer also includes junior fitness sessions and is available on a pay-and-play basis as well as a monthly or yearly membership option. 

Although designed to be fun, the £145,000 investment in new facilities comes with a serious health message for both parents and children about the importance for long-term good health of taking part in regular physical activity. It is a message that will play a key role in addressing the growing number of children who are overweight.

Craig McAteer, Link4life Managing Director, said: “The project was put in place based on consultation between Rochdale Youth Services and local young people and has received funding from the Youth Capital Fund. It will support the other sporting and activity programmes we are running and although we still encourage it, we understand that young people today aren’t doing enough traditional outdoor activity and have different tastes and requirements to previous generations."

Speaking on behalf of Rochdale Council, Councillor Dale Mulgrew, Cabinet Member for Health amp; Social Care, said: "This is a great development which will create opportunities for mass participation in physical activity for young people. The Council is firmly committed to the ‘Every Child Matters’ agenda and the availability of these new facilities will help young people embark on a more active lifestyle and should help us meet our health objectives.”

Kieran Murphy, Marketing Director from SHOKK, the specialised company that is supplying the equipment, said: "It has always been SHOKK's objective to bring modern physical activity solutions to young people, making it accessible to all. The SHOKK concept provides a fun and interactive activity solution for al young people no matter what age, size or background. Walking into the Youth Gyms will provide a unique experience, essentially, it’s a space designed with young people in mind – somewhere they can identify with and a place they’ll want to hang out.” 

Both facilities will be fully open to the public at the beginning of September.

To celebrate the opening, Fun Days have been planned on the weekend of 8 and 9 September, from 11am to 4pm on Saturday at Middleton and Sunday at Littleborough. During the days there will be a chance to try out the new gym and dance mats. Other activities include a bungee run, gladiator game, Sumo suits and penalty shoot out plus a DJ on decks and breakdancing demos and workshop. All activities are free.