Meridian Leisure Centre celebrates its second birthday

By Skegness Video on February 1st, 2012

THE Meridian Leisure Centre in Louth celebrates its second birthday on February 6, 2012 and over half a million visitors have so far passed through its doors.

The £12m state-of-the-art leisure centre was built by East Lindsey District Council to improve leisure facilities in the District and encourage more local people to take part in sport to improve their health.

The Meridian Leisure Centre boasts a range of facilities including a 25m eight lane competition swimming pool with floating floor; a leisure pool with a pirate ship and flume; an 80 station fitness suite; sauna and steam room, child care facility, sports hall, multi-purpose rooms, dance studio, a café, social area and Driving Test Centre.

Since opening the Fitness Suite at the Meridian Leisure Centre has been visited over 54,000 times alone. A special Fitness system called Fitlinx calculates that Fitness Suite users have burnt more than 23million calories in 2.5m hours of cardiovascular exercise. Fitlinx also calculates that Fitness Suite users have lifted 158,309,430kg of weights – the equivalent to lifting 6,350 elephants.

The Meridian Leisure Centre is now home to 18 local clubs, a number of which have been able to expand their range of activities and increase their membership.

Bob Wells from the Louth Dolphins Swimming Club said: “The Meridian Leisure Centre has provided the area with a real boost and The Dolphins with a great home. It is important that people enjoy sport and health activities regularly and the facilities on offer at the Centre are first class.”

Portfolio Holder for Culture, Leisure and Tourism, at the District Council, Cllr Adam Grist, is amazed at what has been achieved in just two years: “The purpose of the Meridian Leisure Centre is to improve the health of local people and the number of people visiting on a regular basis is good news.

“We’ve invested heavily in improved sports provision over the past few years with the Leisure Centre and London Road Pavilions in Louth, refurbished fitness suites in Skegness, Mablethorpe and Horncastle and a new Sports Pavilion in Skegness. We recognise that if the community can access good quality sports facilities they are more likely to take part and ultimately live a better quality of life through improved health.”

Education is also an important stand of the Meridian Leisure Centre’s programme. Through a partnership with the Grimsby Institute of Sport, the Centre is offering student placements allowing them to gain practical experience of working in a leisure centre and to help them work towards their qualifications.

The Meridian Leisure Centre is open seven days a week with memberships from £21.50 per month. Members can enjoy use of the swimming pool, fitness suite, sauna and steam rooms, as well as entry to all exercise classes such as cycle, step aerobics and Aquacise.

For more information and timetables of classes, please visit www.e-lindsey.gov.uk/meridianleisurecentre or call the Meridian Leisure Centre on 01507 607650. Facebook users can also ‘Like’ the Meridian Leisure Centre’s Facebook page.