Te Puke Athletics Club may have folded, but there is a silver lining with Pāpāmoa Athletics Club offering somewhere for Te Puke youngsters to train and compete.

Last month, the Te Puke club announced it was no longer able to operate.

A Facebook post stated: “Due to not enough volunteers and the new requirements needed to run our little club, the decision and hard reality is that carrying on is just not sustainable. Te Puke Athletics will be closing down.

“Not an easy decision, so many great memories, so many families, all the tamariki [children], all the amazing talent in our little town.”

The club has run Wednesday evening children’s athletics during the summer and was also the parent organisation of Te Puke Harriers, which runs winter cross-country and road-running programmes.

President Paulette Oldeman said the main issue was a lack of volunteers able to commit to the club in the long term.

With her daughter Te Koha Kete-Kawhena needing to move up to a higher level and being involved in other sports, Oldeman was no longer able to devote the time to the athletics club.

Another coach, Ethnay Barnaby, who has helped to run the club for around 20 years, has also moved on.

Running coach Selwyn Mawkes has provided training six days a week, including the running side of weekly athletics nights, and will continue coaching.

“We did have some really keen people, but the problem is, to make it sustainable, they’ve got to be there, not just for one year, you’ve got to have people who are really dedicated and have got a passion for athletics to keep it rolling year after year,” Oldeman said.

“We did try over the years and did have some cool people put their hand up, but to be honest, we needed 10 or more.”

The club would need enough people to sit on the committee and run Wednesday evening athletics.

“On the night, if you needed people to help run the night, parents were great, you’d just call them up and they were there, but usually the ones putting their hands up are already committed to other clubs like gymnastics or swimming, so it was quite hard for them,” Oldeman said.

She said after 10 years at the club, she’s gutted about it folding.

“People don’t realise what it involves running a club these days, what happens behind the scenes – setting up the club, making sure you’ve got the programme right, that sort of stuff.

“There’s so much work and to be quite honest, I think a lot of clubs in New Zealand are finding the same thing at the moment.”

Another complication was that the club was no longer incorporated, and while that wasn’t a requirement, it was beneficial, particularly when it came to funding.

“Because it was just me running it, I just found it a bit overwhelming to do all that stuff. My main aim was to make sure the kids had a programme and it was all set up for them,” Oldeman said.

The club folding has raised a question mark over the Harriers programme.

The current season has just finished but it is unclear what will happen next winter, as it is likely to be too small to go it alone.

Mawkes was instrumental in resurrecting the Harriers programme about 10 years ago and has provided guidance for Te Puke and Pāpāmoa youngsters keen on improving their running, whether that is on the track, on the road or cross-country.

He intends to continue to do that and will also become part of a strong coaching team at the Pāpāmoa Athletics Club, where he will offer middle- and long-distance running coaching.

Pāpāmoa Athletics Club committee member Elle Reid, who has also been involved with Te Puke Athletics Club, said the Pāpāmoa club has not had middle- and long-distance running as part of its coaching programme before.

She said the strength of the coaching team at Pāpāmoa across track and field means there are great opportunities for Te Puke and Pāpāmoa youngsters to achieve their goals.

Reid was instrumental in getting the Pāpāmoa club back up and running after a period of inactivity, and said that while she was sad about the Te Puke club folding, there was nothing to say it wouldn’t start up again in the future, “and I hope it does”.