Ref.10582YOUTH club members have been running what is believed to be a unique skateboard and BMX biking course at Pewsey.

The Shak youth club is one of the leading centres in the west for skateboarding and BMX.

Over the last five years the centre has developed a top facility with half and quarter pipe challenges and a variety of ramps and jumps.

Much of the success of the centre is due to the encouragement of the youth development co-ordinator at the Shak, Ivor Richards.

He has supported the teenagers in their requests for skateboard and BMX facilities.

Now the Platform club set up by the skateboarders and BMX riders has plans for a £1.4m indoor centre next to the Shak.

Leading Platform members Ollie Spence and Dan Pyle, both 18, are running what is believed to be the only summer holiday tuition scheme in the country for BMX and skateboarding with certificates for those successfully taking part.

Because there are no recognised certificates for these two sports, Dan, a Salisbury College student, has taken the relevant achievement levels from kayaking another of the leisure activities encouraged at the Shak and adapted them for BMX and skateboarding.

Children from six to 13 have taken advantage of the course run by Dan and Ollie, who is also at Salisbury College, and are working towards certificates at three different levels.

As well as showing them all about the two sports in the safe confines of the Platform premises by the youth club, Ollie and Dan have also been teaching the youngsters basic bike and skateboard maintenance and also the rudiments of first aid. Ollie said: "As far as we know it's the only course of its kind in the country."

Dan said he had heard of similar training sessions in the USA but not in Britain.

Dan said it was the first time the course had been run and they were delighted with the number of children who had enrolled.

He said: "We had this idea of doing something different for the smaller kids and it has been a real success."

Dan and Ollie said they will consider running several similar courses during school holidays in the future.

Twenty-one paddlers from the Shak have just returned from a two week adventure holiday sea-kayaking around the Greek island of Milos in the Mediterranean.

The group was made up of 14 to 18-year-olds and five staff.

Club leader Mr Richards who led the group said they had to put up with high temperatures and high seas.

"This was an ambitious adventure," said Mr Richards who had previously led groups of club members on river kayaking expeditions in Europe.

He said: "The logistics of moving equipment and people around the dusty tracks of Milos was an impressive task as we supported our paddling team."

Those taking part were all qualified kayak users trained by the Shak's own instructors.

Sea training on Milos was led by a resident coaching company before the youngsters began their circumnavigation of the island.

A sea kayak coach from Dorset and two kayak instructors from Berkshire accompanied the Shak's own coaches.

The paddlers carried camping equipment so that they could sleep on the beaches at the end of each day and found the going tough at times, heading into force six gales, said Mr Richards. "However on the last 10k leg on the north-facing edge of the island the wind got up to force seven and they had to abandon their quest five kilometres short of their target.

"None of the young people were overly disappointed.

"They were experienced paddlers after all and they knew that discretion was the better part of valour on that day. They all came away with a tremendous sense of achievement."