Ponds Forge International Sports Centre

After waiting in the wrong queue for 20 minutes, my family of 6 were directed to the relevant queue for a leisure swim. due to how busy the second area was, we were almost 40 minutes late for the 1hr block we were due for. the lovely and helpful staff member by the name of faye, took it upon herself to have us accepted into the next hour of swimming! it really made our day great instead of disappointing. thank you so much.

The swimming pool and staff are excellent. there's no water slides here but the lazy river and wave machine is great fun. reason for 3 stars is the changing rooms. staff do their best to keep them clean and it shows, the changing area doesn't smell and is clean. lockers are £1 coin refundable and a good, large size. the changing area is where i felt let down. there's apx 8 family changing rooms which we used and we're spacious. then there's a male and female changing area which we did not use so i cannot comment. i would of liked to of seen unisex individual changing spaces because my children are 10 and 11 years and i wasn't comfortable for my 10 yr old son to go into the male changing area by himself but having said that, we used the family changing rooms individually and when we visited it wasn't busy, no one was waiting and there were spare family changing areas.

This is an iconic venue for aquatic sports in the uk. we have attended swimming events for which the pool is great. the main pool is a ten lane, 50m set up with decent blocks at both ends. there is a boom that can be used to form two 25m pools. the diving pool is often used for warm up/swim down during races. there is ample space for swim teams and coaches on one side and spectators on the other. there is a fairly basic but less expensive than many cafe and good access by public transport. it is marked down to 4 start as the venue is tired in parts and facilities like toilets are worn. the cleaning teams obviously make an effort but there is only so much that scrubbing can hide! if you get the fagan e to watch an aquatic’s competition here i would say go for it!

Great pool, visited for the british and english summer nationals and the organisation was brilliant. diving pit was used for warm up and cool down during races which was good for the swimmers, cafe serves really good food and isn't ridiculously expensive either!