News, stories and updates from the gym, our education programmes and the wider Training Cave community.
A few years ago, the word “boxing” could stall a conversation with a school before it had properly started. This year, Training Cave became an approved alternative provision with Kirklees local authority.
Two boxing classes and a bit of PT covered the rent. Then the kids who couldn't pay kept coming anyway — and something had to change. How an unpaid-subs problem turned Training Cave into a social enterprise, and why that decision still funds every place we give away today.
When I read that PE is the most frequently cancelled subject in schools, I don't read it as a headline. I read it as a list of kids I probably haven't met yet, who are about to lose the only door they had into something that could genuinely shape who they become.
For a lot of the kids who come through it, it's the first step into everything else we do at Training Cave.
Five years from one school to quality assured alternative provision status
When we first started Training Cave, we set it up as a limited company. We didn't have a business plan. We didn't really know what we were doing — we just thought we were opening a boxing gym
What nine years of Training Cave has taught me about trust, belonging and preparing young people for life