#not2TUFF2talk
Survey results
May 2019
This page summarises the results of the Tuff Fitty mental health survey. Based on these results with the overwhelming support of members, Tuff Fitty signed up to the Mental Health Charter for Sports and Recreation.
More than fifty members completed our mental health survey. This represented a third of our entire membership. We were absolutely bowled over by this fantastic response.
We were also incredibly pleased by the overwhelming support for our proposals and the very positive individual comments we have received. Thank you. In particular there was near unanimous support (just one respondent who didn’t give an opinion) for Tuff Fitty to sign up to the Mental Health Charter for Sports and Recreation.
Based on these results, on 21 February 2018 Tuff Fitty became one of the first triathlon cubs to sign up to the Mental Health Charter for Sports and Recreation.
Responses to survey questions
Q1 More than 80% of respondents said that someone close to them had been affected by mental health.
Q2 All of our respondents said that physical activity improves their overall mental health/wellbeing. More than 90% said that physical activity improved their mental health/wellbeing “a lot” or “quite a lot”.
Q3 It’s not just about physical activity, respondents also said that being part of Tuff Fitty contributes to their health and wellbeing in other ways.
Q4 There is strong support for all five of our draft objectives
• To raise awareness and understanding of mental health and wellbeing.
• To promote good mental health and wellbeing through:
– swimming, cycling and running
– being part of a welcoming, inclusive and positive community.
• To make Tuff Fitty a safe place for our members to talk about their mental health and wellbeing.
• To support our members to seek help when needed.
• To provide leadership on mental health and wellbeing across the triathlon and sports community in West Sussex and beyond.
Q5 There was overwhelming support for Tuff Fitty to sign up to the Mental Health Charter for Sports and Recreation
Q6 Forty-one respondents said that they would be interested in taking part in a mixed ability team event to raise money for Coastal West Sussex Mind.
Individual (free form) responses
Here is a small selection of the free form responses we have received.
- I’ve suffered with mental health issues over the last few years. Physical exercise (especially tri training!) is a huge part of sustaining my mental health and improving my wellbeing. Anything we can do to help promote triathlon and exercise in general with regard to people’s mental health has my full support.
- Tuff Fitty has been a great help to achieve things I had never imagined I could. It is a fantastic opportunity to everyone to start a hobby, to get back in shape or simply to meet new friends…Totally backing up the idea!
- I completely support this.
- Fantastic idea. Something that gets my full support.
We also received one comment that expressed concern that we might be
exposing the club to risk by holding ourselves out as experts and whether there we needed to designate individuals and provide training for them.
As part of our awareness raising we will continue to emphasize that we are not mental health professionals. The #not2TUFF2talk initiative is about making Tuff Fitty a safe place to talk about mental health issues and recognising the benefits of swimming, cycling and running for mental health and wellbeing. In our communications we will continue to:
- encourage anyone who is struggling with their mental health and needs professional support to contact their GP and our partners Coastal West Sussex MIND
- encourage anyone who is caring for someone who is struggling with their mental health to contact West Sussex Carers Support.
