Horsham Little Athletics is gearing up for a new season with some important upgrades to crucial equipment and facilities.
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The club is patiently awaiting the return of community sport, with current COVID-19 protocols preventing them from beginning their competition.
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When it does return however HLA will be buoyed by a $3400 grant that they recently received from Coles.
That money will go towards a new wireless starting system and trolley to support volunteers, according to HLA president Nigel Binney.
"We've got a wireless starting system but it's one of those things that needs to be continually upgraded," Binney said.
"Rather than having a volunteer with a stopwatch for every lane you've got a far more accurate (system) that takes human error out of it.
"That's really useful for our competitions to go smoothly each week.
"The trolley will be a high jump trolley. We're looking at being able to tow a trolley out with the high jump mats on it to avoid people having to handle them."
HLA also hires equipment out to schools for athletics carnivals, so the equipment will be of benefit to a huge portion of the community.
In other positive news, the club has also had a new equipment shed built at Dudley Cornell Park.
Binney said the shed, which was funded by a federal sporting grant, would enable volunteers to "get the high jump trolleys in and out smoothly".
While it is been hard for the president to gauge the interest levels of participants during the current restrictions, past data suggests that the recent Olympics should provide a spike in competitor numbers.
"Interest levels are a bit hard to tell, our registrations are open. We typically get them close to that starting day," Binney said.
"We certainly saw an uplift three years ago when the Commonwealth Games were on.
"We'd expect to see a good level of interest given we've had the Olympics this year."
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