Member Article

Kent Running Club Announced as Community Award Winners by British Superbrand Pitman Training

The Hawkinge Hurricanes Running Club, situated in Folkestone, Kent, was proudly announced as the winner of the ‘Community Award’ as part of Pitman Trainings 2018 SuperAchievers awards, after being chosen out of hundreds of nominations from across the UK were submitted to the British Superbrand.

Hawkinge Hurricanes Running Club was first established in February 2016 by a small group of dedicated volunteers. The club adopted one main aim: to offer all ability, all-inclusive running for the local community. Currently, the club has excelled in its goals by providing a fantastic club to the local community whilst supporting over 100 athletes including, proudly, supporting two disabled athletes too.

The Hawkinge Hurricanes Running Club support all abilities of athlete and offer twice yearly beginner courses, social and charity events. Previously, they have already been proud runners up in the Shepway Sports Trust Club of the Year Awards in 2016 too.

The Hawkinge Hurricanes Running Club, Folkstone, is completely volunteer-run and is a non-profit making club who also achieved Clubmark status in 2017- deeming that the club is run to the best of its ability and is in the interest of its athletes.

The club is motivated by the enthusiasm and love from the volunteers and coaches as they pride themselves on observing people, from all walks of life and abilities, achieving their personal goals albeit their first 5k or reaching their own weight loss goals.

The UK’s leading and most recognised independent training provider, Pitman Training, initially launched the SuperAchievers Awards 7 years ago for individuals. The aim of the awards was to demonstrate that anything is possible and to graciously reward people who are committed to driving their careers forward in a positive direction and strive for their best. However, this year Pitman Training was no longer looking to only better individuals and decided to run the ‘Community Awards’ for the first time to recognise the hard work of community groups too.

Pitman encouraged groups that have made a difference within their community to enter this brand new award category as a way to celebrate and recognise what they have collectively achieved. As a reward, the group is presented with £1000 worth of training with Pitman’s vast array of training availabilities, the training is for staff, organisers or volunteers within the groups to fill skill gaps or improve existing knowledge that they may have, previously, been unable to do.

Sam Miller, Hawkinge Hurricane Running Club member,says: “We are so lucky to have won and it is going to be such a help to our club. All our coach and leaders are volunteers but with a growing club comes growing administration. The training will help our club to be the best it can be and give us and our members confidence in how things are run behind the scenes. So we are looking forward to getting ahead-of- the-game with some courses, we will look at the finance training, Photoshop, Marketing or Excel courses.”

6 community organisations from across the UK have received the ‘Community Award’ for having made a difference within their community. Winners of Pitman’s ‘Community Awards’ were determined and decided upon by a combined judges panel of votes and the public vote.

Claire Lister, Pitman Training Group’s Managing Director, said: “As part of this award we wanted to shine a light on local volunteers who are really contributing to local communities and to be able to give them a platform to not only shout from the rooftops about the incredible work that they do but also invest in the future growth and development of these incredible community organisations.”

Pitman Training offers flexible, tailor-made courses and qualifications with one-on-on student support in subjects including Office, IT, Administration, Finance and Business, which are recognised by employers. The team also offer free career clinics and CV’s advice.

This was posted in Bdaily's Members' News section by Becky Hayles .