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Partnering with VicHealth and Baseball Australia, the City of Ballarat aims to increase female participation in all sports across the municipality, as part of the Active Women and Girls initiative.<\/p>\n
To commemorate Girls at Bat\u2019s fourth and final session, Australian Emeralds player Abbey McLellan visited Prince of Wales park to encourage and congratulate the women on their progress.<\/p>\n
\u201cThese regional centres that are popping up with these awesome programs are doing a brilliant job of fostering participation from the grassroots level,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n
The baseball star also said that increasing female interest in sport is great, as it can form pathways to playing on a national level.<\/p>\n
\u201cIn the early days of my career, I played on a lot of male teams where I was the only girl on the team, or even the only girl in the league,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s just not very encouraging, it doesn\u2019t motivate you to show up or play, so it\u2019s brilliant to have these women here giving it a try.\u201d<\/p>\n
On Saturday, 21 March, the girls will head down to the Bellarine Peninsula, where they will take part in a variety of training exercises and social games.<\/p>\n
In future, the Alfredton Baseball Club are hoping to be able to organise a program for the women, where they can compete with other teams around the state.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
FOR the past four weeks, a determined group of women have met every Sunday morning to practice and refine their baseball skills. Hosted by the Alfredton Baseball Club, the Girls at Bat program provides a welcoming and safe environment to introduce girls and women to the sport. With more than 80 women expressing interest in […]<\/p>\n