Saturday the 8th of February saw the return of the annual Scottish Disability Sport Young Persons’ Sport Panel Residential! This year being held at the sportscotland National Sports Training Centre Inverclyde in Largs. Nine of our panel members travelled from all over Scotland to attend and we were delighted to be joined by four members of the Young Start Programme too.
The weekend kicked off with an overview of our busy schedule from Alison, followed up swiftly with a Social Media refresher from mentor, Ross. Then we jumped right into an amazing dance session, delivered by Scottish Youth Dance. This involved some hilarious partner choreography, and we all managed to get stuck in with learning a brand new dance to some great music. Afterwards we got to check into our rooms before we headed down to Largs Beachfront for a quick walk and wheel before dinner at Tony Macaroni’s, which just had to be followed by some delicious ice cream from the famous Nardini’s!!
When we got back to the centre it was straight into the Gymnastics Hall for a very active evening session of Trampoline, Gymnastics and a lot of fun! Everyone had a go and most ended up in the foam pit at some point. In case that wasn’t enough, some of us stayed up late to round the night off with some board games.
Sunday morning, we were back at it all again, recapping yesterday’s events after getting a quick breakfast in at the centre. Hollie delivered a session on LGBTIQ+ Inclusion on behalf of LEAP Sports Scotland which ignited some incredibly interesting conversations around intersectional barriers to sport. Then we headed along to the studio for a Boccia session, expertly led by our very own Boccia Leaders: Charlotte, Grace and Layla. We were so excited to have Aileen Neilson, Paralympic Curler and ambassador for the YPSP programme, along to join us for this and some great chat over lunch afterwards. Our penultimate session of the day was led by Events Administrator Charlotte, where we got the ball rolling on our plans for the upcoming SDS National Exhibition Event on June 14th at Stirling University.
Our last session was a new, updated, delivery of the Disability, Identity and Sport workshop led by Charlotte, Grace and Ross. We all contributed some great feedback to keep the course updated and interesting and it was so nice to have time to discuss all the benefits we have found from being on the panel and broadening our sense of community. We wrapped up the weekend with a team picture to celebrate before we got packed into the cars and drove off, homeward bound!
We would love to thank our mentors Caitlyn and Ross for their continued support throughout the weekend, as well as our accompanying SDS Staff members Kathryn, Hollie, and of course, Alison – who we cannot believe has already started planning the residential for 2026! See you next year everyone!
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Charlie’s Experience –
Hi, my name is Charlie and I’m a wheelchair user.
I play wheelchair badminton and am a part of the SDS Young Start programme. As a part of this programme, I got the opportunity to go on a residential weekend with the brilliant people on the SDS YPSP to the Inverclyde national sports training centre, before going on this residential I was quite nervous as it was my first time away from home overnight without either of my parents. I also felt nervous because of the fact I didn’t know many of the other people attending the residential and I am usually not the most talkative and confident person.
It turned out that there was absolutely nothing to worry about as everyone at the residential was lovely and so welcoming that I felt like I fit right in and almost like I already knew them with how easily I found talking and having fun with them.
I got the chance to do some amazing things there such as learning an entire dance routine which beforehand I wasn’t sure about but I thoroughly enjoyed it. I got to hang out with everyone else inside the gymnastics hall which was a highlight for me as getting to just chill and have fun with new people and other people like me was amazingly refreshing. I feel like I have gained a great load of independence and especially confidence from my short time on the residential and I feel I have made some great friends and connections within disability sport. I will always be thankful for this opportunity and will always look back on the great memories I made with happiness.
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