successful figure athlete credits crowborough leisure centre for her success

Vanessa Tanner, 28, a personal trainer at Crowborough Leisure Centre operated by Freedom Leisure, has praised the Centre and its gym manager, Steve Collins, for helping her prepare her for her first national figure athlete competition.

Vanessa Tanner, 28, a personal trainer at Crowborough Leisure Centre operated by Freedom Leisure, has praised the Centre and its gym manager, Steve Collins, for helping her prepare her for her first national figure athlete competition. Vanessa came second in the fitness testing category of the Miss Galaxy Universe competition earlier this month. This is no mean feat with contestants having to perform as many set exercises within a minute as they can manage. By the time Vanessa had completed a minute of each exercise, she had worked pretty much every muscle in her body!

Vanessa is a familiar face in the gym at the Crowborough Leisure Centre. Not only does she train regularly for her own fitness, Vanessa is a personal trainer for others in the gym where she has worked part-time for four years while also studying for an osteopathy degree.
“I have been interested in training as a figure athlete for a couple of years and everything came together for me recently at Crowborough Leisure Centre,” says Vanessa. “The standard of training is excellent,” she says. “The gym manager Steve Collins’ knowledge about how to reach my goals was really valuable and this combined with the new Olympic lifting equipment in the gym transformed my training,” she says.

The new equipment provides many more machine and free weights options and methods of training. “It took a little bit of getting used to but now everyone’s up and running with it very nicely,” says Vanessa. “My clients enjoy the variety of equipment and I enjoy the fact that people move around the gym really well and we no longer have a queuing problem around certain stations,” she says.

Vanessa is certainly setting an excellent example to her clients and other gym users. “It’s good for people to see their personal trainers being put through their paces and it keeps us alert to how it feels to be on the receiving end of training!” says Vanessa who is now working towards another figure athlete competition later in June.