Hundreds turn out for community sport event

Hundreds of people have attended an event to highlight local sporting activities and give residents the opportunity to discover and try new sports.

Viva Slough, a social enterprise and community interest company, put on a free event that included judo, hockey, and karate.

Organiser Amandeep Mangat, who works with public health teams in Slough, said the event helped raise awareness of local opportunities as "the statistics are only getting worse, people are doing less and less activity every day".

It comes as data shows that life expectancy in Slough is lower than national and regional averages.

Data published by Slough Borough Council in April 2026 showed that women live to about 82 and men 77, which is lower than national and regional averages.

Mangat said the event was free to remove barriers and show that "physical activity is for everybody, you just need to find the thing that is fun to you and you can fit in your routine".

About 600 residents attended, including Yana, who took her two-and-a-half-year-old daughter Maria to try some sports.

She said: "I want to introduce to her as many [sports] as possible so she can make her own choice."

Yana and her young family moved to Slough two months ago and said this event had made her realise, how many sports clubs are available on her doorstep.

Rhian Richards took her son to this event to encourage him "to try different types of exercise."

She added that her son had spent the previous 30 minutes trying judo and had "already found one other thing we can try. I imagine we'll come out today with lots of ideas".

In a field behind Lynch Hill Enterprise Academy, different stalls offered activities ranging from judo to health checks.

Nishkam SWAT, a charity, that aims to provide free FibroScan liver health checks to underserved communities was among those in attendance.

Taran Rai from the charity said that they were invited to provide free checks as "these kinds of communities are actually at risk for liver disease".

The organisation decided to take their services to the local community as "many people aren't aware that you can get these free liver health checks especially on the NHS, so we aim to come down to communities to break down the stigma and encourage people to come forward".

Mangat aims to make this an annual event so that the local communities can be aware of what is on offer on their doorsteps.