At the heart of the Sydney Swans new headquarters in Australia is an elite player-focused training facility by strength equipment specialist BLK BOX

Australian Rules Football team, the Sydney Swans, moved into its new headquarters recently and along with the relocation came new functionality for its training – all delivered by Belfast-based fitness equipment specialist, BLK BOX Fitness.

The Swans’ new home is the impressive and historic Royal Hall of Industries building in the Moore Park district of Sydney, close to the historic Sydney Cricket Ground where the team plays its matches.

In its 100-plus year history, the building has seen use as a boxing venue, ice skating rink, art gallery and ballroom. But the new interior is now unmistakably a Sydney Swans elite training space, with a full indoor football field and a large range of functional, strength and accessory equipment from BLK BOX.

Player connection
So how did the BLK BOX-Sydney Swans collaboration come about? Rob Inness, head of athletic performance, said team members were impressed by previous BLK BOX installations for elite sports training facilities, such as those completed by the company for premier league football team Manchester United and Loughborough University in the UK.

Inness says: “We needed a training space that could accommodate all our players, as well as our young academy members and that often means from 150 to 200 people training at the same time.

“The bespoke equipment and layout from BLK BOX enables the whole team to train and bond. That connection between them is really important. The players love coming here. In fact, one of the big challenges is getting them out of the place!”

When designing and specifying the equipment, BLK BOX needed to take into account the specific training needs for the male and female players of AFL and AFLW – a sport that requires explosive strength, speed and endurance.

As a former Gaelic Football player, BLK BOX founder Greg Bradley, was no doubt more in tune than most about the type of training equipment and layout required to provide a truly elite and team-focused facility for players at the top of their game.

He says: “To guarantee high performance training, we designed and manufactured a custom Samson 12-Bay Rig, complete with custom branded plates and weight plates.

“The bespoke rig was designed to include six Smith Machine attachments and resistance band holders.

“These rigs can easily accommodate between 20 to 30 players training at the same time, which fosters a very cohesive and motivating environment and strong team camaraderie.”

Also designed and manufactured back at the 140,000sq ft BLK BOX headquarters in Northern Ireland were a BLK BOX 45-degree plate-loaded Leg Press Machine, GHD Pro, 45-degree Hyper Extension and a Big Ass Belt Squat Machine.

Fast installation
The road to completion was delayed by COVID, however, once everything was back on track and the BLK BOX kit was shipped and on-site, the full installation and fit-out of the entire project took only two weeks.

The 10,000sq ft Sydney Swans training space, which is complemented by a range of community and public facilities, represents BLK BOX’s first major project in Australia.

Bradley says: “While we’d done smaller fit-outs in New South Wales, Sydney Swans is the first large-scale project we’ve completed in Australia and our first project for an AFL team.

“We realised we were competing with home-grown suppliers, but BLK BOX’s reputation in the field of elite sports and the uplifting, motivational training spaces we’ve been able to create for many professional teams certainly worked in our favour”.

For all of its projects, BLK BOX offers a complete end-to end ‘made in NI then shipped’ service for sport and fitness clubs anywhere in the world. This covers concept design, through to manufacture, installation and on-site training. With such capabilities and a strong customer focus, it’s not surprising the reputation of BLK BOX has spread across the globe.