Friends' Health & Fitness

By Leah McCrae, Member Services Officer, Friends' Health & Fitness

Exciting Facility Improvements

Behind the scenes, we have been working on plans for some big facility improvements to support our ongoing commitment to child safeguarding, facility upgrades, and improving the experience at Friends' Health & Fitness.

On Monday July 11, we commenced the construction of our new, fully-appointed, Learn to Swim, child-only changeroom facilities. The area will consist of two large changerooms (male and female), as well as private cubicles (all gender, all ability) for changing and showering of children before, and after their swim lessons. The area will also provide a new multipurpose room. 

The estimated timeframe for construction will be approximately 3 months, so we hope to be using the new area by some time in October.

We are very pleased to have the opportunity to invest in, and provide improvements to our facility that support The Friends’ School and Friends Health & Fitness’ commitment to child safeguarding and customer experience.

Equipment Upgrades

To support our commitment to investing back into our Friends' Health & Fitness community, and improving the experience at Friends' Health & Fitness, we received and installed a variety of new premium equipment in the Centre over the last few months. The equipment ranges from new Yoga equipment, premium Life Fitness strength equipment, as well as a  variety of fantastic strength equipment and free weights.

It has been great to see our Friends' Health & Fitness community be able to utilise the wide variety of equipment to improve their health and fitness journey, as well as adding value to our members' memberships.

We welcome enquiries about our exclusive Friends' Community membership options and encourage our wider Friends’ community to email our friendly team at fhf@friends.tas.edu.au.  

Growing Team

Over recent months we have been working hard behind the scenes to recruit additional passionate team members to add to our dedicated team, and improve the ongoing experience and services offered at Friends' Health & Fitness. We have had the pleasure to welcome new team members across all areas within our Centre, from our Gym and Group Fitness spaces, through to Learn to Swim and our new Friends' Swimming program.

Group Fitness News

Our Group Fitness members have enjoyed a wide range of fun and exciting pop-up classes and events over recent weeks, as well as the benefits of a new and expanded group fitness timetable with new class offerings such as Yoga and Metafit.

Our most recent pop-up group fitness events were our ‘Light up the bikes’ spin classes and pop-up Zumba to mark the Winter Solstice, with the classes run by disco lights. Participants thoroughly enjoyed these offerings, and we look forward to running more exciting pop-up events in the future.

Each month we have been highlighting one of our team members, as well as a Class of the Month. This allows our members to better connect with our team and their strengths, as well as showcasing specific benefits from the various styles of classes we offer so that individuals can feel comfortable to try new styles of classes, which support their personal health and fitness journey and goals.

Teens in Group Fitness 

We welcome teens between the age of 13 and 16 to participate in certain Group Fitness classes (listed below). Teens between 13 and 16 years of age must be actively supervised by a parent/guardian for the duration of the entire class they are participating in. Classes can be accessed through various discounted community membership offerings, as well as casual passes.

Approved classes include: Pilates, Yoga, Aqua Fit, Spin Fit/RPM and Body Balance.

Learn to Swim

Our Learn to Swim program continues to thrive, offering quality swimming education delivered by our experienced and friendly Swim Team. 

There has been an increased focus on the ongoing upskilling of our team. This week our team will participate in training with MAST, which focuses on the importance of effectively teaching water safety skills to benefit both our team delivery, and engagement from the children in our programs. 

In Term 1 2022, we introduced new software and iPads to mark attendance and progression of skills, which has been an important step forward in providing our swim families with an improved Learn to Swim program and transparent communication. Excitingly, this allowed us to introduce our online Parent Portal access to our learn to swim families in Term 2. Parents and Guardians can now follow your child(ren)’s progression throughout all programs via the online portal. 

Friends' Swimming

After several months of preparation, Friends' Swimming commenced on Monday 11 July. 

It has been amazing to see so many Friends’ students joining the program, with very limited spots available within the program. 

These new offerings are designed not only to support The Friends’ School in its provision of improved swimming pathways for its student base and Learn to Swim students, but also to support the general community in gaining access to high quality swimming development programs in a supportive, friendly environment.

The aim of Friends' Swimming is to deliver a performance swimming program in a fun team environment, supporting swimmers in achieving their personal, and sporting goals. Based primarily out of thr Friends' Health & Fitness Centre, the program will combine in-water training, strength and conditioning sessions in the gym, and structured dry-land training to focus on overall athletic development. 

Head Coach, Reo Lazaro may be contacted at friendsswimming@friends.tas.edu.au for further information.