A GYM is to offer free self-defence classes to women in the wake of the Sarah Everard's death.
Glove up for Good, a not-for-profit boxing gym based in Hailsham, will run the first session on Sunday, May 2.
The classes will be led by a qualified karate instructor and will teach women how to defend themselves in threatening situations as well as how to diffuse a tense situation.
Hannah Isom, the organisation’s co-founder, said she was “saddened” to hear about the death of Sarah Everard and was “moved” to act.
She said: “The news was playing on my mind quite a bit and it struck a bell with me.
“I thought to myself, ‘well we’ve got the gym and we need to use it’ to be able to help women and give them some knowledge so they know what to do in certain situations.
“It will also help women who are in relationships that are violent because abuse does not always come from people you don’t know. It’s often from people you do and it’s often the person you are in a relationship with.
“It’s just giving women a little bit of knowledge about things that are out there, people they can call and things they can do to make other people aware.”
The boxing gym had originally planned to run a single, one-off session, however after receiving an “overwhelming” number of enquiries, the team are looking to offer more classes.
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They are currently planning to run weekly sessions alongside a Zoom class for people who are unable to attend in person.
Hannah, 34, said: “I’m really looking forward to it. We have now had so many people interested I thought ‘we can’t do this as a one-off, we’re going to have to run it all the time.
“We’ve had people get in touch to say they are interested from right across the country, which is great.
“There’s quite a few women involved with the gym who have experienced some form of harassment from men.
“We were all saying that sometimes when women walk by men, we try to look a little tough, so they ignore us or don’t give us attention.
“It’s funny the things we do.”
For more information on how to register for classes, visit https://gloveupforgood.org.uk/ or https://www.facebook.com/Gloveupforgood.
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