The lead youth worker for Streatham Youth and Community Trust (SYCT), Mark Wood, will be volunteering at the London Olympic Games on the 6th – 11th August. The event that he is attached to will be Taekwondo and his role will be to get the equipment for the athletes ready for the different competitors. This will involve preparing the hand guards and other equipment for the participants, who are segregated from outside contact in advance of the fight. When asked how he got this role, Mark said that he simply volunteered. He said that each person submitted an application outlining their skills and the Olympic officials reviewed and accepted him. Out of 400,000 applicants, 70,000 were accepted and after four days training and a one day test event, Mark will be ready and he says he is looking forward to this once in a lifetime opportunity to take an active part in the world’s biggest sporting event. As each day will only run from 5:30AM to 11:30AM, Mark will then be free to spend the afternoon helping with the Youth Centre’s summer project, which involves activities such as sport or cultural events for the young people.

Streatham Youth Centre has a strong connection to sports, especially Taekwondo. Its team is of a particularly high quality, having competed in events all around the world; this year alone they have already gone to compete in Thailand and America. Mark says that the people at the Youth Centre he has told are impressed and even jealous and SYCT is looking forward to the games.

Based on information supplied by Clive Winter.